Self Portrait 1881

This self-portrait was painted in 1881 by John Pettie, a Scottish painter working in London who used oil on canvas. Pettie's rough handling of the paint in this portrait demonstrates the influence of the Realist movement of mid-19th century France, particularly as it migrated into the English art world. The Realists were keen to take painting away from idealized historical or mythological scenes and instead focus on the lives and faces of everyday people, with all their imperfections, and to suggest the real conditions of their work. Pettie, who made his name painting historical genre scenes, turns a critical eye on his own profession and class, depicting himself as a successful but flawed artist who has lost touch with the common people. To understand Pettie's project more fully, we can consult exhibition catalogs, reviews in popular journals, and letters written by the artist and his contemporaries. Art is always contingent on social and institutional context, and to understand it fully we must reconstruct the artistic discourses of its time.