Portraiture’s formal tradition
Painted portraiture has a reputation for being stuffy and formal. While this unfortunate characterization has some truth to it, it’s important to see it in the context of the genre’s history.
The staid nature of portraiture stems from its popular origins as a form of subtle propaganda. While the genre may have been established to immortalize kings and popes, it wasn’t until the 16th century Dutch got a hold of it that portraiture really caught on. Early democracies like the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands and the United States embraced the genre that was once reserved for patricians as a way of insuring that the remaining aristocrats knew that they were no better than anyone else. Painted likenesses of everyone who could pay for one sent a clear message that the people were as noble as their work ethic and getting richer every day. But in order for these portraits to have the desired impact, they had to resemble those of the nobles. They had to follow certain established conventions of formality, and a dress code was part of that.
Of course, portraiture doesn’t have to play by those rules anymore and the kinds of artists who insist that it should are catering to a very specific kind of client.
When I meet with a subject to photograph her-him, I don’t encourage any particular wardrobe choices. Sometimes clients ask me what they should wear for the portrait. When they do, I respond that I may change the color of their clothing but never the neck line. Simply put, they should dress in a manner that they feel is representative of who they are. This is just one aspect of the collaborative nature of portraiture: with my work, I am responding to who the subjects are, so I need to see as much of who they are as possible—and that includes how they dress.
When I met with Max and with his sisters, Siobhan and Gabriella, the wardrobe choices were especially interesting.
Each of the siblings had settled on very different kinds of clothing…
...with Max’s being by far the most traditional and formal.
During a photo session I ask a lot of questions, and the interview process is different depending on who my subject is.
With adults, I tend to ask a lot of introspective questions and questions that inspire them to tell me stories from different periods of their lives.
With children aged 3 and under, I have to rely on the subject’s parents a lot more—as was the case with Hazel.
But kids like Max are in an interesting in-between phase.
They certainly don’t need their parents to speak for them, but they aren’t particularly interested in many of my adult interview questions either.
So instead of asking Max and his sisters “what do people miss about you that you wish they saw in you more readily?” I asked them “how do you want the portrait to look?”
Max replied “funky.”
Gwenn Seemel
Max
2010
acrylic on canvas
36 x 24 inches
(detail below)
Brilliant! I loved the juxtaposition of his formal attire with his wish to be immortalized as playful.
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CATEGORIES: - Process images - Practice - On portraiture -
