Self-Portrait

"To eternalize one moment in life, to project it into the future as a model or merely as evidence of one’s existence, has rendered the painting of portraits common practice since Neolithic times to contemporary photography. [...] Image is not only determined by individual perception but also by collective moments which set their mark on how we see each other and ourselves. Even in self-portraits where the sitter and artist are one and the same, the public dimension is present in the way the artist chooses to present himself. How does he build that narrative so as not to strip himself naked in the mirror?
Iberê started doing self-portraits at a very early stage. On August 18, 1940, as stated with graphic precision in his drawing – the artist portrayed himself naked from the waist up, his torso only partially sketched in. He was very young, barely 26, but, youth notwithstanding, the pose was mature, concentrated. Three years later, two other drawings show him as just a face gazing fixedly into the mirror [accession numbers D0033 and D0036]. With his head bent slightly, the artist seems to be asking something of the spectator from the other side of the glass."
María José Herrera, Iberê Camargo: um ensaio visual (Porto Alegre: Fundação Iberê Camargo, 2009), 99.