Vis à vis an artist’s self-portrait is a thematic exhibition that revolves around the idea of portrait and self-portrait , understood not so much as places and figures of affirmation of a full subjectivity but, paradoxically, of its withdrawal, retrar-si understood as a step backwards that takes place in the very place of its exhibition. L’ self-portrait contemporary is configured, in fact, as a silhouette, shadow, reflection, imprint or as a sort of portrait of the artist as a model, character or stereotype etc. which instead of affirming the fullness of a creative subject tends to deny it, disguise it, deconstruct it, mask it or multiply it. In short, the methods of portrait and self-portrait examined in this exhibition seem to definitively abdicate the classical idea. It will not be an exhibition of portraits and self-portraits (pictorial, photographic or video, etc.) that deal with their historically determined forms but rather with their mythical origins and their posthumous incarnations. In fact, the exhibition is not moved by the intention of tracing analogies between the contemporary and the history of art, but instead seeks to reflect on the meaning of similarities that should not be surprising. If it is true that “the portrait makes its appearance in the history of art parallel to the subject in the history of philosophy” (Jean-Luc Nancy) it should not seem strange that, in an era of full-blown crisis of the subject, portrait and self-portrait find themselves articulate the differences and contradictions that mark the partitions between identity and new practices of subjectivity, nor, therefore, that the representation of a face be separated from the problem of identity and its visible elaboration.

Edited by Saretto Cincinelli and Cristiana Collu.

The exhibition includes works by: Andy Warhol, Cindy Sherman, Ketty La Rocca, Francesca Woodman, Robert Mapplethorpe, Daniela de Lorenzo, Liliana Moro, Massimo Barzagli, Cesare Viel, Ana Mendieta, Shirin Neshat, Luigi Ontani, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Giulio Paolini, Gino De Dominicis, Arnulf Rainer , Roman Opalka, Ugo Mulas, Gilbert & George, Urs Luthi, Massimo Barzagli, Grazia Toderi, Vanessa Beecroft, Eulalia Valldosera, Nan Goldin, Andres Serrano, Greta Frau, Claudia Casarino, Mariko Mori, Nan Goldin, Barbara Bloom