The Insistent Subject:
The three very different self-portraitists have all received much critical attention, and their work is interesting enough to reward careful viewing. But the meaning of their pictures is dependent on the fact that they’re self-portraits, a fact that also insulates the work from some kinds of criticism.
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John Coplans, ex-painter and former editor of Artforum, makes large black-and-white images of his aging body, photographed with a clarity that proclaims each millimeter of his skin worthy of attention. Self-Portrait (Double Feet, Five Panels) shows his feet pressed together, his legs apparently crossed, in five side-by-side images revealing adjacent or overlapping parts of his feet, including scars, discolorations, scabs, and body hair. Self-Portrait (Three Times), in which three views of his nude midsection are superimposed, is dominated by his protruding abdomen. Coplans has been praised for his willingness to confront his own aging, challenging the conventional idea of a beautiful body by presenting his own as art–doubtless an admirable goal. But it’s not particularly original, nor does his work reveal any special vision beyond a serviceable photographic technique. In the end, I wondered whether Coplans differed much from the young photo or film student who trains his lens on his dick.
I found Sherman’s posed and costumed shots of herself weirdly similar to William Wegman’s witty if rather silly photographs of his weimaraners–as canoeists in life jackets, as Cinderella and her carriage horses. Both photographers deny the subject any authentic self but instead, in the best pomo fashion, construct a series of disguises or masquerades. Both entrap and manipulate the viewer: the way Sherman assigns us the aggressor’s role parallels the way Wegman pushes all our buttons to win us over to his dogs’ cuteness, with their appealing expressions and improbable situations. Just as Sherman constructs herself, Wegman makes his dogs into substitute humans, bred and clothed for our viewing pleasure.
Sander shot most of his subjects full figure in the middle of the frame, and succeeded so well at finding diverse types that the Nazis, seeing in his subjects the untermenschen they wanted to exterminate, banned his pictures and destroyed many. But what’s most subversive about his photos remains subversive today: Sander simultaneously ennobles and exposes his subjects, revealing all their contradictions. The man in Unemployed Man, Cologne stands tentatively against a building, hat in hand, eyes a bit more confident than his body language would indicate; his bald head and erect figure also belie his hands’ humility. In Farmer a man stands in the middle of a road dressed in his Sunday best; presumably he’s the master of the fields around, yet his face is a mixture of self-assurance and doubt. There’s a hint of sadness in its deep lines and in his eyes. His clothes and the setting partly define him, but the camera’s distance from him and the complexity of his expression allow him a certain freedom–unlike Sherman in her photos, where she’s trapped in the role she’s assumed for herself.
