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Item: Self-Portrait

Jimmie Durham

1987

Sculpture, 173 x 87 x 29 cm.
Materials: canvas, wood, paint, feather, shell, turquoise, metal

Collection: Collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (Inv. no. JD56).

"The Self-Portrait got to be very popular right away as soon as I made it. But I didn’t exactly make it on purpose. I made it because a gallery was doing a show of self-portraits and asked me to join. I said, 'Well I don’t do self-portraits, so I’m not going to do it' And they said, 'Come on, everybody is going to do it.' It was all minority artists doing things together.

So I had the idea as soon as I hung up the telephone: 'Okay, I’ll lie down on the floor and Maria Thereza can draw me on the canvas; then I’ll carve my face and see what else I will do...'" [full text here]

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About M HKA / Mission Statement

The M HKA is a museum for contemporary art, film and visual culture in its widest sense. It is an open place of encounter for art, artists and the public. The M HKA aspires to play a leading role in Flanders and to extend its international profile by building upon Antwerp's avant-garde tradition. The M HKA bridges the relationship between artistic questions and wider societal issues, between the international and the regional, artists and public, tradition and innovation, reflection and presentation. Central here is the museum's collection with its ongoing acquisitions, as well as related areas of management and research.

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