Sunday, November 1, 2009

A Living Schiele




her palette...










(one of Amalia's self-portraits, mixed media on gessoed canvas...)
This fall I am teaching a self-portrait class through Continuing Studies at MECA, and each week I give the students an assignment that will hopefully be like a trampoline - a jumping off place for their ideas. Last week with Halloween approaching, I asked students to do a costumed self-portrait. One student, the beautiful and talented Isabel (Amalia) Ramirez, confessed her fascination with Egon Shiele's work and the "bruised" quality of his models. She decided that she would be her self-portrait, and proceeded to transform herself into a Shiele drawing! Amalia allowed me take these pictures of her as she experimented with fabrics, trims, articles of clothing, and make-up to become a living Shiele. I believe that she did a remarkable job in capturing the zeitgeist! What do you think?

4 comments:

Lauren said...

I love love love egon, despite the slight preversity of his work, there's something so strong and powerful about it...

Susan Beauchemin said...

Egon Schiele died at the age of 28! He died on Oct 31st! I just looked him up from your link. I thought she WAS the model for Schiele's paintings!

Susan Beauchemin said...

He died of the Spanish flu just three days after his wife--sad!

Dean Grey said...

Martha!

Amalia's work looks wonderful. She has a really nice style!

Thanks for sharing her art with us and the link about Egon Schiele!

-Dean