Beverley Hood: Self-Portraits (Versions 1-3)
Artist(s):
Title:
- Self-Portraits (Versions 1-3)
Exhibition:
Creation Year:
- 2003
Size:
- 225 cm x 84 cm
Category:
Keywords:
Artist Statement:
Self-Portraits (version 1 – 3) is a series of larger-than-life digital prints that reflect upon the tradition of portraiture (in particular, the artist’s self-portrait) and explore the potential of this genre in the 21st century.
The work was created using 3D character-animation software, selected as a contemporary medium and logical progression of tools available for figurative representation and modeling. With these tools, three computer-generated portraits (version 1 – 3) were created. They begin with “sketched” version I, which retains much of the software’s default figure proportions, and become progressively more detailed and realistic in the subsequent versions. However authentically rendered, all the resulting figures retain a strongly synthetic nature. The portraits are reminiscent of computer-game characters, yet they present a progressive development toward a more “normal” body shape. This normality provides a level of contradiction to the work. Although the figures are very obviously computer generated, they do not present the stylized shapes normally associated with 3D characters (in computer games, etc). Rather than the normally centimeters-high computer-generated characters we encounter on screen, the large scale of the prints presents the viewer with figures of relative proportions to the human body. This uncomfortable enlargement is intensified by the figures being in fact slightly too large, provoking a somewhat intimidating presence.
