Self-Portrait

"'The self-portrait is an introspection, a looking into oneself as well as an interrogation whose answer is also a question. The image that the painter lifts from the mirror, or the placid surface of the water, reveals what he sees and how he sees the world'.
At any rate, this is what Iberê believed, for whom portraits and painting in general were one of the ways in which man manages to halt the flow of time.
[...] Another drawing of that time shows Iberê with the tools of his trade: to the right in the background, a jug stuffed with brushes leaves us in no doubt as to his occupation. Once again, it is his large, inquisitive gaze which invites us to join the scene. The artist has decked himself with the tools of his trade. He challenges his own image in front of the mirror: I am he that sees and I represent what I am, thus disclosing his soul to the contemplator. Valiant, courageous, arrogant, melancholic, the story of a man’s life is told by its main protagonist. As if this were in fact a visual manifest, the sitter surrounds himself with things, objects which create an atmosphere and colors that proffer information about who he is."
María José Herrera, Iberê Camargo: um ensaio visual (Porto Alegre: Fundação Iberê Camargo, 2009), 99.