Although the word 'selfie' may be new, the idea of making an image of yourself is not, it's something that artists have been doing for years and years. Photography was my major subject at university and self-portraiture is a subject that really interested me so when I saw this GZ it seemed like the perfect excuse to share a little of my interest in art with people who enjoy another of my interests, (geocaching).
In order to get the final coordinates you'll have to learn a little about some of the interesting, important or key events in the timeline of selfies and self-portraits.
Rembrandt
Self Portrait with Two Circles
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Although he definitely wasn't the first artist to paint or draw himself, Rembrandt is one of the early masters of the selfie. The Dutch artist painted almost 100 self portraits during his career and they helped build his reputation as one of the most talented artists of all time. His works are valued for their honesty, detail and for the length of time they span, (his earliest was painted when he was in his early 20s and the last when he was in his 60s). He's also recognised as having a new and influential way of painting light and shadow.
Hippolyte Bayard
Self Portrait as a Drowned Man
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These days everyone has access to apps and computer programs which allow us to 'enhance' our photos or even create fantasy selfies but in the early years of photography people believed that cameras were more scientific than artistic and that they didn't tell lies. This makes Hippolyte Bayard's fictional self portrait important for being the first ever staged self portrait. He produced it in protest when he felt he was unfairly cheated out of being acknowledged as one of the inventors of photography - ironically his rival's photographic technique, the daguerreotype was pretty much forgotten after cheaper techniques became available in the 1860s whilst Bayard's melodramatic statement earned him a different place in the history of photography .
Vincent Van Gogh
Self Portrait with Bandaged Ear
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Van Gogh is one of the more famous artists of the 19th century and this is probably his most recognisable self portrait. It was painted not long after the infamous argument with Paul Gauguin during which Van Gogh cut off part of his left ear. This picture has helped fuel the debate around the stereotype of 'the tortured artist'.
Frida Kahlo
The Two Fridas
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Frida Kahlo's place in the surrealist group is clear in this image with all of it's symbolism. Kahlo used her art to explore and express the experience of being a woman in a way that was groundbreaking for the time. In Two Fridas it seems as if she is questioning her heritage (a German father and a Mexican mother), as well as making reference to the many painful surgeries she underwent.
Cindy Sherman
Untitled #114
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Like Frida Kahlo, Cindy Sherman used self portraits as a tool to explore what it means to be female, but she took a totally different approach. Sherman used her (many), untitled photographs to question the roles that woman are allowed to take, her first series focused on roles in the movies but her work since then has looked at more general ideas about women's place in society. Her work is a great starting point for exploring feminism and identity in art.
Jo Spence
Work (part iii) - The history lesson
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Jo Spence was one of my heroes as a photography student, she thought the camera was more than just a way to make pretty pictures or trap memories, for Spence her camera was a tool for talking about things that scared her or for giving power and voices to people who didn't always have a voice to speak. She photographed her experience of having cancer and she was one of the first artists to talk about photography as a type of therapy. These days many people value the importance of photography as a way for people to heal through telling their own stories and it is frequently used by art therapists as a valuable part of their therapy toolkit.
A new word!
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The word selfie had already been around for quite a while before it was made word of the year by Oxford Dictionaries. The word was chosen because: "Language research conducted by Oxford Dictionaries editors reveals that the frequency of the word selfie in the English language has increased by 17,000% since this time last year." The term has produced a whole load of similar words including belfie (a picture of your butt), welfie (a selfie taken whilst working out), felfie (a selfie taken by a farmer) and dronie (selfies made using drones), there's almost definitely more but I think that's enough!
Ai Weiwei
Leg Gun / "Beijing anti-terrorism series"
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When Ai Weiwei's "Leg Gun" selfies first arrived on Instagram it became clear that even the humble selfie had the potential to become a political weapon. When he explained his meaning the artist said that he wanted to make people think about the purpose of using violence to fight terrorism, he said: "People from all over the world have been experiencing panic because of terrorist attacks such as 9/11 and problems such as the existence of weapons," and "Power is being overused in the name of counterterrorism." Instagram is one of the international social media platforms which isn't banned in China and this meant that soon hundreds of people all over the world were posting similar pictures with the hashtag #gunleg.
Banned from Disney
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After first banning customers from taking selfie sticks on the rides, Disney announced a total ban on selfie sticks in its theme parks because: "Handheld extension poles have become a growing safety concern for both our guests and cast." Disney joins a growing number of places where the selfie stick is no longer welcome - this is probably a good thing given just how dangerous the selfie can be.
Selfie Rat / Zardulu
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It seems that it's not only humans who like to take the occasional selfie - for a short time the internet was buzzing with talk about Selfie Rat - a rodent which jumped on a man sleeping on the subway platform in Brooklyn and took a selfie using its nose. Some time later it was revealed that Selfie Rat was an elaborate hoax dreamed up by a mysterious artist known as Zardulu but by then Selfie Rat had already joined the selfie hall of fame.
N 24° Selfie Rat / Van Gogh . Bayard / Dictionary / Spence
E121° Kahlo / Disney . Rembrant / Sherman / Weiwei
You can check if you've got the right solution at GeoChecker.com.
To claim your find please post either a selfie of your own beautiful faces (but not at GZ!) or that of an artist you like.