If I Say So
(A midsummer wander in portraiture)

 

During his speech (approx. 30 minutes), Daniel Lesbaches approached the topic of portraits and related the exhibition concept of Faceless Faces to visual arts and literature. To begin with, in regards to portraits, Daniel said: “Many portraits are often self-portraits”.

In relation to Faceless Faces, he said: “Contemporary art happens when you question things”. 

 

The title If I Say So derives from one work created by the artist Robert Rauschenberg. In fact, in 1962, he was invited by Iris Clert to a group show revolving around portraits. Rauschenberg replied by sending a telegram saying “This is a portrait of Iris Clert if I say so”. 

 

Several artists and artworks were mentioned. Among them: Portrait of Eva Hesse (1966) by Mel Bochner; Untitled (Portrait of Marcel Brient) (1992) by Felix Gonzalez-Torres; Les Amants I, II (1928) by René Magritte, etc. 

 

Below, a brief excerpt from the speech:

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A very interesting example was Portrait of Frank O’Hara (1962) by Elaine De Kooning, Willem’s wife. Daniel explained that she was one of the rare women artists involved in abstract expressionism. In this painting, the artist made a portrait of O’Hara but then erased the face. Why, though? Elaine explained: “When I painted Frank O’Hara, Frank was standing there [...] but when the face was gone it was more Frank than when the face was there”. In other words, by erasing the face, the personality is better expressed, according to the artist. 

 

Another great example was Portrait of Dieter Kreutz (1971) by Gerhard Richter. This is part of a series of portraits in which the artist blurs the faces.  “These are erased portraits, like ghosts”. 

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Portrait of Dieter Kreutz (1971) by Gerhard Richter

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The work Andy Warhol (1962 - 1992) by Marcus Leatherdale was also explained. In relation to this, Daniel said: “portrait can be also done by highing the face”. “Warhol loved to show his face, and made a lot of self-portraits. Here, Leatherdale decided to do a series entitled Hidden Identities”.  

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Andy Warhol (1962 - 1992) by Marcus Leatherdale

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Professor Lesbaches also showed the work Daniel Lesbaches, portrait on 15 February (1999) by Claude Closky. The artist made a portrait of our art expert! “All the days of my life were used to create my portrait. It is a conceptual portrait”, said the speaker. 

 

A very interesting case, later described, was the following. The poet Lautréamont, a.k.a. Isidore Ducasse, wrote a long poem named The Songs of Maldoror (1870). The book is about a fictitious character and it became a major reference for Surrealism. For a long time, the face of Lautréamont was unknown. In other words, “he was faceless”, said Daniel. Some people, like Dalì, made imaginary portraits of him. “There are many people/authors that we don’t know the face of, such as Lautréamont or Shakespeare”, explained Daniel. 

 

The speech was concluded with the introduction of the book The Garden of the Finzi- Contini written by the Italian author Giorgio Bassani. In one of the chapters, i.e. chapter VI, the protagonist is remembering a woman he met years before and he portrays her in words. From Chapter VI: 

“How many years have passed since that far-off June afternoon? More than thirty. And yet, if I close my eyes, Micòl Finzi-Contini is still there, leaning over her garden wall, looking at me and talking to me. In 1929 Micòl was little more than a child, a thin, blond thirteen-year old with large, clear, magnetic eyes [una tredicenne magra e bionda con grandi occhi chiari, magnetici]. And I was a boy in short trousers, very bourgeois and very vain, whom a small academic setback was sufficient to cast down into the most childish desperation. We both fixed our eyes on each other. Above her head the sky was a compact blue, a warm already summer sky without the slightest cloud. Nothing, it seemed, would be able to alter it, and nothing indeed has altered it, at least in memory.”