Self Portrait Quotes

I sat back and looked at it. It was ugly, dark, uncontrolled. Like a monster's face. Or maybe what I saw there was my own face. I couldn't quite tell. Was the face the image of something evil or the image of myself?"Both," Bea muttered, as if I'd spoken my question out loud. "Of course, it's both. But it shouldn't be. Goodness, no.

I see myself through others eyes and I am made anew.

Already the people murmur that I am your enemybecause they say that in verse I give the world your me.They lie, Julia de Burgos. They lie, Julia de Burgos.Who rises in my verses is not your voice. It is my voicebecause you are the dressing and the essence is me;and the most profound abyss is spread between us.You are the cold doll of social lies,and me, the virile starburst of the human truth.You, honey of courtesan hypocrisies; not me;in all my poems I undress my heart.You are like your world, selfish; not mewho gambles everything betting on what I am.You are only the ponderous lady very lady;not me; I am life, strength, woman.You belong to your husband, your master; not me;I belong to nobody, or all, because to all, to allI give myself in my clean feeling and in my thought.You curl your hair and paint yourself; not me;the wind curls my hair, the sun paints me.You are a housewife, resigned, submissive,tied to the prejudices of men; not me;unbridled, I am a runaway Rocinantesnorting horizons of God's justice.You in yourself have no say; everyone governs you;your husband, your parents, your family,the priest, the dressmaker, the theatre, the dance hall,the auto, the fine furnishings, the feast, champagne,heaven and hell, and the social, "what will they say."Not in me, in me only my heart governs,only my thought; who governs in me is me.You, flower of aristocracy; and me, flower of the people.You in you have everything and you owe it to everyone,while me, my nothing I owe to nobody.You nailed to the static ancestral dividend,and me, a one in the numerical social divider,we are the duel to death who fatally approaches.When the multitudes run riotingleaving behind ashes of burned injustices,and with the torch of the seven virtues,the multitudes run after the seven sins, against you and against everything unjust and inhuman,I will be in their midst with the torch in my hand.

Julia de Burgos Jack Agüero Translator

All my images are self-portraits, even when I'm not in them.

All portraits reveal both the the painter and the person painted. In many ways all paintings are self-portraits. All part of why art informs.

I see... the way you're always searching. How much you hate anything fake or phony. How you're older than your years, but still... playful, like a little girl. How you're always looking into people, or wondering what they see when they look back at you. Your eyes. It's all in the eyes.