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Hello everyone,
today we're going to talk about selfies.

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Selfies are the most modern way we have
of people showing images of themselves.

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But we've been showing images of ourselves
for thousands of years.

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So, in our talk we're going to look

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at the relationship
between what we're doing now

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and what we've done previously.

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Say for example
you don't know what a selfie is,

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you don't have a tween
with an Instagram account.

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I'll tell you,
a selfie is an instant self-portrait

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which you take from a mobile device,

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you outstretch your arm and you snap it.

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It's all you, 


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there's no professional photographer,
there's no editor,

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there's no curator

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and then you instantly upload it
to the Internet for global consumption.

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So your private life is exposed
for everyone to see.

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Being a selfie maker,

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you're both the creator
and the subject, and you choreograph

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how you're going to look in a selfie:
you decide your body language,

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your proximity to the camera,
where you're going to look,

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what you're wearing,

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your milieu and very importantly
your facial expression.

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The medium itself
has a very specific aesthetic.

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First of all, most selfies
have a square format,

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usually they're viewed
on an intimate scale,

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maybe on your cell phone or mobile device.

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They have a very specific
photographic distortion

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which usually is from the arm's length,

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of the proximity of the camera lens,

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so this can make your face distorted,
or maybe part of the background distorted,

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and then also because 
of the arm's length proximity,

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the picture itself has a very
shallow collapsed sense of space.

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Many selfies,

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maybe it's because of expertise or not,
have a blur within the image itself,

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and finally a lot of the selfies have 
this almost soft, unsaturated sepia tone

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that have an almost nostalgic 
quality to them.

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Many people dismiss selfies as being
narcissistic, frankly many of them are,

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and most people can't help
looking at themselves.

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I mean if you walk past a mirror,

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almost everyone takes a look to see
how things are going on.

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(Laughter)

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But let's think of selfies
in relationship to art history.

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Are they traditional, 
or are they revolutionary?

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Traditionally, when people
had their portraits taken, painted,

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they were done by an artist,

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and they were seen 
through the artist's eye.

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Here we have Louis XIV 
as the Sun king, the artist has expertly

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expressed his view of the world 
of how he wanted to express himself.

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Sometimes,

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even if you are 
the most powerful person in the world

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and you hire the greatest artist,

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the portraits weren't 
particularly always flattering.

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But now we've gotten rid of the artist 
as the conduit, as the intermediary.

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And everyone is an artist,

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so they can decide
how they want to brand themselves.

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And with every image, they can change

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their brand, their image, to the world, 


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advertising themselves to the world.

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So, your self is a very fluid concept
that is constantly being able

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to be moved and developed unlike
the portrait of Louis XIV,

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which we now know hundreds
of years later what his message was.

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Let's think about self portraits,

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traditionally self portraits

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we think of Dürer here as a self 
constructed artifice,

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he took ideas, what he wanted his beliefs 
and his ideas and put them in a painting.

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Here we have Dürer 
equating his artistic genius

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to that of almost a Christ-like creator.

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And then we have the contemporary selfie

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showing us his superiority with his 
all-knowing facial expression.

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So let's think about selfies that fit
into other traditional categories.

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Let's consider body language.

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Here we have a senator, 
this Roman senator,

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Audience: Aw!

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with this very frontal facial expression,

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this unflinching expression,

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looking straight at the camera.

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And today, when people want 
to express power in their image,

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they use this exact same body language.

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Let's think about... Here we have
a Hellenistic Aphrodite,

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her head is tilted in coy flirtation,

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as she is flirting
with the Satyr next to her.

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And over and over in contemporary selfies,

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we have the same exact body language.

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Many times -
(Laughter)

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Here we have Hercules,

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his head is bowed down,

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his arms are away from his body,

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so that we can look at his toned,
muscular, powerful torso,

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because this is what defines him
as who he is, as his character.

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And again and again, in contemporary
selfies, we have the same idea.

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Even in this contemporary work,

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the subject's head is even distorted
by the camera lens,

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it's back and a blur because
his focus is his chiseled physique.

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So his physicality becomes 
an expression of who he is.

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Here we have Rembrandt as a young artist:

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his eyes are sunken and dark
and deep and moody,

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he's got pursed lips,

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his hair with his golden
highlighted coifs,

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and we have this contemporary selfie

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attempting to express 
the same exact poetic angst

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and anguish of youth and talent.

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Not only can we refer to

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art history for references,

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but also to Hollywood,

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so here we have Mary Pickford
as a certain type of ingenue

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with her golden locks, her doe eyes,
her can-do spirit,

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and we have the contemporary selfie
modeling herself

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almost exactly with that same idea.

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Not only are selfies about

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modeling yourself,
but also showing people who you are,

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where you've been.

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No matter who you are,
they want you to know where they've been

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and they want you to maybe be jealous.

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So not only look where I am, 
but look what I have. (Laughter)

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Do you value what I have?

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Do you judge me by what I have?

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Let me show you what I have.

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Look who I'm with.

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No matter who you are and no matter
how powerful you are,

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you still want to legitimize your time

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by showing that you're
with someone who's of import.

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We live in a world where we're constantly
being documented and documenting.

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Because of this, we're very self-conscious
of the photographic process.

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So as a response,

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when we're taking selfies, a lot of people

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make a very exaggerated
facial expression,

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freeze it and then take the picture.

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Because they want to make sure

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that you know that they're choreographing
that instantaneous expression.

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Certainly they don't want to be caught
in a photograph where they're actually

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instantaneous, unflattering and real.

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Exposure to Hollywod has shown us

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how to pose for pictures,
how to smile for pictures,

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but now this awareness of
constant documentation

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has made a very new expression
that is really very specific to selfies

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and has been dubbed the duck face.

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Selfies are part of the whole history

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about looking and being looked at.

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Every selfie is an act
of having yourself on display.

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Every selfie is an act of self-voyeurism.

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So let's consider the gaze
in some of these pictures.

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Here we have Manet's Olympia.

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She is challenging us
as we look at her nudity.

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She's looking at us looking at her.

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And we have this contemporary selfie,

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taking this very same pose,
using the same eye contact,

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everything is very deliberate
and purposeful.

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Another idea of looking at the gaze
is when a subject is looking away.

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Then they are part of the landscape,

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part of a still life,
an object to be admired,

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without letting the viewer know
that they're being looked at.

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So ultimately, 
who is the visual consumer of the selfie,

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and how do we understand images

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when they're taken out their 
content and context?

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Maybe one person 
will read this in one way,

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and another person in another way.

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So what we do is

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we place our individual perceptions,

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our individual experiences

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and perspectives on the image,
and that creates a multitude of readings,

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a multitude of stories.

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Because ultimately selfies are a poignant

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example of the fact that people crave
to be recognized,

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they crave to be remembered, validated.

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This is an attempt to do these things.

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But this medium, you can look
at so many images

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at one time that can be compared,
contrasted,

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dismissed, juxtaposed,

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and every subject creator is always 
searching for originality

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when they're making their images.

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We have to think,
when we're looking at these pieces,

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when you're looking at a selfie
or you're taking a selfie,

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you have to think, how do I fit
into the historical context?

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Thank you!

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(Applause)