«Self-Portraiture: The Art of Self–Research» by Nurit Cederboum

«…The subject looking in the mirror is ego. Opposite ego is the self, whose thinking has a different rhythm and order. The initial ‘mirror encounter’ ego observes passively and the encounter offers an opening for ego to use its cognitive understanding, to make decisions and act. Ego observing the image in the mirror illustrates the expression that the ego looks into the depth of the soul. Ego looks at the true self, which resides in the soul, in the head or in the person’s personality. The ‘mirror encounter’ invites the passive, observing ego to become active and look deeply inside….»
This book presents a year’s long study, where the researcher-artist engages herself within the activity of self-portrait drawing, facing the products and employing them both as research instruments and theme. The research takes interests in this unique activity, in its significance in an individual’s or an artist’s life, and in psychological, philosophical and artistic implications associated with and deriving therefrom.
The research integrates the artistic activity, which is perceived as a research in itself, combined with a scientific research method, bearing the spirit of a “grounded theory”. This book introduced the unique research method, which is described as “art-based research”, further shedding a new, broad light on the common phenomenon, known as ‘self-portrait drawing’.