Looking Inward Self Portrait Class - 19 May 2020

Chest and Belly

 

Soft pink flesh

Hairy plump scarred

Reveal

Grab

Aging male

Any old one

This old one

Alive 

Images

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p1 (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p2

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p3 (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p4 (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p5 (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p6 (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p7 (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p8 (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p9 (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly w2p10 (2020)

Added Later

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly addendum (2020)

Larry Wolf, Chest and Belly addendum (2020

References - Hands on Flesh

The work of two artists were bouncing around in my mind as I was working on the images: John Coplans and Gian Lorenzo Bernini.

John Coplans is famous for his portraits of his aging body, and the Bernini, this sculpture from the 1600s , is famous for the hand print, the imprint of the fingers in the flesh, which is in marble, quite an artistic accomplishment. The title of the Bernini is “rape”. It's a violent moment, cloaked in mythology, wrapped in beauty and polish. Coplans is that way too, very stylized, but making you see his aging body.  

John Coplans (1920-2003)

John Coplans, Self Portrait (Hands Spread on Knees) (1985)
Photo at tate.photo.uk

Coplans About the Photographs

I try to regard the body and mind as inseparable, a single field of human experience that encompasses the perceptual, the intellectual, and the pains and pleasures of memory. 

John Coplans

http://www.johncoplanstrust.org/about-the-photographs

Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680)

Gian Lorenzo Bernini, The Rape of Proserpina (1622)
(photo credit: Joaquim Alves Gaspar (2015))

The Class - May 12, 2020 through June 9, 2020

Lillstreet Art Center - Photography Department - Online Looking Inward: Self Portraiture

Instructor Shterna Goldbloom