The Phenomenon of Reflection as a Method of Own Art Research

Belgrade, in the course of my studies, the research I did was pre-
dominantly related to self-portrait. In this case, I am using the word
self-portrait in a relative meaning as, in a way, it represents but does
not necessarily imply a self-(re)presentation of my image. The eyes
see the world around them, but at the same time create a person-
al impression of that world, so they play a double role. Self-portrait
mainly comes at certain stages of life and can be the expression of
ego showing us our own imperfections. Precisely through the frame
of the eye I have tried to visualize my inner self, take a stand and ask
questions to myself and the world around me. I must admit that at
the very beginning I was not fully aware of the symbolism the eye
in the form of self-portrait could represent. Simply, one day, a look
at my reflection in the mirror made me think that precisely my own
image was what I wished to explore.
People face their mirror image every day – whether they like it or
not – and, looking at it, most of us feel like changing a thing or two
about our face or body, even if only a tiny detail, visible to no one but
ourselves. We are living in a world dominated by commercials that
keep telling us what we should actually look like. The faces and bodies
of people we see on TV look too perfect to be true. We are aware that
it is a kind of illusion created by the mass media and yet we comply.
To our complete frustration, we even struggle to live up to the surreal
bodies and faces gazing at us from screens and billboards. Of course,
this mission impossible creates a sort of uneasiness and very few end
up satisfied with what they see in the mirror. Unlike Narcissus 2) , we
are in no danger of falling in love with ourselves. The eye of God has
been substituted by the eye of the media, guiding us and shaping our
opinions and moral attitudes. Although I believe that beauty matters,
we apparently live in a society that not only mercilessly and inces-
santly promotes beauty, but also sets the unattainable standards of
beauty, forcing us either to fit the mold or die trying.
So, where does all that leave me as an artist? Perhaps my position
is somewhat superior as I, like a kind of plastic surgeon, feel free and
have the opportunity to change the face looking back at me from the
mirror. I also have the freedom to represent only the parts of my face
and body that I like best. Even to change them at will. I must admit
that I have rarely resorted to such tricks and mostly transferred the
truth to canvas. And yet, I did have a wish to make it likable. I believe
that it is intrinsic of art to please the eye, one way or another. An
image should trigger a kind of emotion with the viewer, I should say
– a positive emotion. Most artists today opt for provocation irrespec-
tive of whether their work provokes love or fear, hatred, repulsion
or no matter what, as long as there is a reaction from the audience.
Therefore, when I look in the mirror these days, I wonder what I am
actually looking for. How much of the things I have found would I
like to convey to the people and the world around me, or how I want
them to react. Is self-portrait a study of my personality or a kind of
fantasy? Indeed, the source of it all is nothing but love for oneself and
one’s image, the wish to be liked by others, too. Probably there is also
a bit of self-love, vanity and other, not highly positive qualities.
Maybe I was just trying to keep up with the times and show
myself in the most beautiful light possible. To match my own illusion
and hide the imperfections of which I was fully aware. That was how
it started; in the beginning I did not give much thought to whether
I wanted to achieve anything. It was enough for me to paint my own
image on canvas as true to life as possible and feel satisfied with the
result. To present beauty for beauty’s sake, to admire and let others
admire it.
Living at the turn of the 21st century, we are witnessing an exciting
and transformative period which has changed the entire human race,
a new era which is blurring the lines between the local and the global,
roots and mobility, work and free time, culture and a spectacle. These
changes are occurring as a direct result of new communication and
supervision systems, consumer society, globalization and its main
technological tool – Internet, which has, over the last 20 years, spun
its web over the entire planet, turning our eyes to the computer or
smartphone – in other words, to the screen and our own reflection in
it. Mirjana Đošić is an artist who uses subtle artistic touches to depict
the space in front of the screen and behind it, and various changes
occurring to all of us, changes in our views and experiences of living
in a community.
Her early works already featured certain motives and actions that
would later reappear in her work in various forms. This includes, in
particular, framing and magnifying of an eye/eyes, committed inter-
est in perspectives, (non)intermediate view, and optical reflection. In
her works – oil paintings, pastel paintings, collages or combinations
of all three of these techniques – she uses fragments of everyday life
and memories to make new compositions, creating new perspectives,
drawing images that emanate peace and quietude while at the same
time hiding something inconsistent or “unnatural”– and thus play-
ing with our assumptions and expectations. In the first stage of her
work, she carefully chooses between the multitude of her own paint-
ings or those by other artists, which she is exposed to every day, and
which easily and quickly travel throughout the planet. She frames
and magnifies their details, creating the sense of long periods of time,
and providing the “time for reflection”, which we all seem to lack
nowadays, in this era of superficiality and commotion. She turns her
paintings into collages, adding fragments of newspapers and adver-
tisements, imbuing it with the physicality, words, colours and rules
of the “real” world. Most often, she places magnified sunglasses with
a reflecting glass surface at the centre of the composition, creating a
space for a verification of the realness of the environment, in which a
visual game is played with the viewer. The image seen in the glasses
is not always a true reflection of the environment, thus becoming a
special, hybrid reality, one that only appears to be natural, indicat-
ing that simulations and mirages are becoming more “real” than the
reality itself. As the artist herself states in an article, glasses are used
as a “replacement for eyes and for a mirror”, leaving room for inter-
pretation of the object as an allusion to the surface of the screen, the
window into the world of today, so ubiquitous that we sometimes rely
on it more than on our own senses and physicality. This new, modern
“mirror” can be found in the artist’s digital self-portraits – her play
on a self-portrait as a combination of a selfie and a staged personal
reflection – the frequently narcissistic and carefully edited collages of
images of ourselves that we create on social networks and online in
general. Perhaps most attuned to the time are those pictures where
the human eye may be glimpsed through the glasses - pictures indi-
cating the mature technological idea of intermediate view and visual
networking of human vision with the screen/interface.
Mirjana Đošić and other contemporary artists are still privil-
eged as viewers into the world, and, working in the medium, they
are likely to be more sensitive to optical and cognitive changes which
may go unnoticed by others. As creators of “another reality”- actions
directly affecting the reality, they are the best at noticing paradigms
shifts and directions of technological development, which increas-
ingly participates in our subjectivization.
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2) Narcissus was a hunter in Greek mythology, son of the river god Cephissus
and the nymph Liriope. He was a very beautiful young man who fell so
much in love with his image in the creek, that he died of desire for himself;
later on gods turned his body into a flower named after him; fig. a man in
love with himself, a beautiful young man.