Personal Data explores the portrait across definition, intent and links between the historical and the contemporary. Early manifestations of self-portraiture include cave paintings and in the assemblage of plastered human skulls in prehistoric art. The sculptured portrait represents some of the oldest forms of this genre.
Portraiture as we currently understand it flourished in Ancient Greek and Roman sculpture, through the carvings of the Egyptian Pharaohs to the daguerreotype in the middle of the 19th century. Today, portraiture expands like its cousin in literature, where portraying a character is a subtle combination of fact and fiction.
Contemporary artists similarly use their hands and imagination to build portraits and construct a conceptual gaze. Artists use their lives and surroundings as carved representations of themselves. Personal Data combines the definitions of a portrait across art and literature – with the guidance of contemporary artists who freely create compelling portraits that expand beyond the composed image to include the individual artistic representation of a person, place or thing.
