Title of Artwork: “Self-Portrait”

Artwork by Joshua Reynolds

Year Created 1775

Summary of Self-Portrait

Self-portraits done in character or by pulling a face were a common sort of student practise. However, this picture was painted while the artist was the most well-known one alive. It sounds less like an experiment and more like a well-thought-out assertion.

Possibly trying to convey the artist’s struggle to produce an image from his raw elements, Reynolds may have focused on his own difficulty to hear (he grew deaf in later years). Reynolds emphasised the challenging and, by extension, morally elevating nature of art in his lectures at the Royal Academy.

Information Citations:

En.wikipedia.org, https://en.wikipedia.org/.