pose b&w

pose b&w, originally uploaded by cazkhel.

What are my thoughts about self-portraits? Self-portraits are a continuing struggle (and preoccupation, in some ways) with artists of all kinds. Many artists do self-portraits, the thinking being that if one can adequately represent SELF then one can perhaps more adequately represent someone, or something, else.
It is hardest to look closely at oneself.

Doing a self-portrait is a provocative experience. How we think we look to others, or how we think we come across to others, can be quite different from what happens in reality. It's a matter of how we project ourselves and sometimes ego or need or anxiety gets in the way of -- interferes with -- that projection. It is considered to be one of the harder experiments, to see if one can capture one's essence in a way that reflects one's important aspects that are also seen by others as important.

Given that, however, we must remember that others see us through their own emotional filters, through their own needs and egos and anxieties of the moment. What they think they see in us may not be a fair representation of us at all although they don't necessarily know that. We can only do our best to project ourselves as fairly and as openly as possible so as to evoke real and meaningful dialogue with others.

Remember that self is illusive at best; not all parts of the self can be reflected in a single moment but rather over time in flowing movement. The more fragmented or fractured our experience in the world the more disjointed our reflections.
The elements that I hoped to encompass by that single image of mine include critters, cameras, computers and self-reflection.

What we see is who we are. We see the things we see because of who we are. We cannot be seen as separate from our subjects or as separate from the environment in which we find ourselves. Photography is just a way of being in the world. I chose it because it is a way, for me, of being in the world that feels harmonious, rather than in conflict, with the natural world.