Self Portrait - Raphael Soyer

Hyperrealism 1967-2012
<exchanging gazes> 5

Hyperrealism. 1967-2012

22 March to 9 June 2013

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Autor:: Tom Blackwell
Título:: Triumph Trumpet (detail)
Fecha:: 1977

Técnica:: Oil on canvas
Medidas:: 180 x 180 cm.
Ubicacion:: Private Collection, New York.
image © Tom Blackwell photo © Louis K. Meisel Gallery, New York

<exchanging gazes> 5: Interior Scenes. Women and Daily Life.

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From 26 February to 10 June 2013

Autor:: Nicolas Maes
Título:: The Naughty Drummer
Fecha:: c. 1655

Técnica:: Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid. Nr. INV. 241 (1930.56)

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Self Portrait

Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection

Autor:: Raphael Soyer
Título:: Self Portrait
Fecha:: 1980

Técnica:: Oil on canvas
Medidas:: 61 x 50.8 cm
Úbicacion:: Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid
Numero de inventario: INV. Nr. 762 (1981.41)

More information about this work

The Jewish painter of Russian origin Raphael Soyer, like his twin brother Moses, was a prominent figure on the New York art world as a major practitioner of the urban realism advocated by the members of the American Scene. Raphael remained faithful to this language throughout his artistic career, as can be seen in this late Self-Portrait belonging to the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza collection.

In addition to urban scenes, Soyer was strongly attracted to portraiture. He produced a large number of self portraits, in addition to many portraits of his relatives and friends. This outstanding example is a frontal image of the artist at his easel in the solitude of his New York studio. It was executed in 1980, shortly after his diaries were published, and may therefore be regarded as an act of recapitulation and self-exploration.

The direct, solemn figure of the painter, by then in his eighties, stands out against the whiteness of the background wall that is half plastered following a repair, and on which hangs a small copy of Masaccio’s Tribute Money, the scene portrayed in the famous fresco paintings in the Brancacci chapel. With its simple setting and total absence of conceit and the inquiring expression the subject wears, the portrait captures the painter’s warm, straightforward personality.

Paloma Alarcó

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