Saturday, February 14, 2026

Self-Styled

Filippo Napoletano (Filippo Angeli)
Landsknecht from the back
(series, Capricci e Habiti Militari)
before 1629
etching
British Museum


Aimée Duvivier
Armand-Louis Le Boulanger, Marquis d'Acqueville
ca. 1791-96
oil on canvas
Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Texas

Anonymous Printmaker
Mr. J. Proctor in Nick of the Woods
ca. 1840
lithograph
National Museum of American History, Washington DC

Aimé Dupont
Sarah Bernhardt as the Duke of Reichstadt
ca. 1900
platinum print
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Alice Boughton
Henry James
ca. 1906
gelatin silver print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Anonymous Photographer
Portrait of a Woman
ca. 1910
platinum print
National Museum of American History, Washington DC

Arvid Fougstedt
Toreador
ca. 1910-15
oil on panel
Göteborgs Konstmuseum, Sweden

Guy Pène Du Bois
Opera Box
1926
oil on linen
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

Anonymous Photographer
Glamorous Woman
ca. 1930
hand-colored gelatin silver print
National Museum of African American
History and Culture, Washington DC

Louise Blair Daura
Mamie Berry
ca. 1939
oil on canvas
Lowe Art Museum, University of Miami

Henri Cartier-Bresson
Leonard Bernstein
1960
gelatin silver print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Walter Bennett
Nicole Alphand, Washington Hostess
1963
dye transfer print
(commissioned by Time magazine)
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Anonymous Photographer
Paul Newman
1969
photo-lithograph (poster)
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Beverly Conley
Candida's Bridal Party, Chelsea
ca. 1986
gelatin silver print
National Museum of African American History and Culture, Washington DC

Judy Dater
Jorge Livia
1996
gelatin silver print
Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, California

Todd Eberle
Jessye Norman
2007
dye transfer print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Sam Contis
Untitled (Sheet)
2016
inkjet print
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

Spirit of Plato

Eagle! why soarest thou above that tomb?
To what sublime and star-ypaven home
        Floatest thou? 
I am the image of swift Plato's spirit,
Ascending heaven; Athens doth inherit
        His corpse below.

– Anonymous (of uncertain date), translated from ancient Greek by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1818)