Issy Wood’s self-portraits explore online-age anxiety at London exhibition
Issy Wood’s first major public exhibition of self-portraits is showing at London’s National Portrait Gallery. The paintings turn her close-cropped, hazy style towards her own face, presenting intimate scenes of sadness and self-scrutiny that the reviewer says also reflect the anxiety and ennui of life spent online.
The works include Wood drinking Diet Coke while wearing a face mask, pressing her cheek against a mirror, crying, and leaning against a guitar; two childhood portraits offer a contrast, while plastic monster fingers add humour. The review describes the paintings as uncomfortable but compelling, and argues that Wood has influenced a wave of imitators. The exhibition runs until 28 February.
- Issy Wood’s first major public self-portrait show is at the National Portrait Gallery.
- The paintings explore sadness, self-scrutiny and contemporary malaise.
- The exhibition runs in London until 28 February.
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Issy Wood is a British artist known for paintings with hazy detail and tightly cropped views. Self-portraits are pictures artists make of themselves, often using their own appearance to explore identity, mood or how they see the world.
The National Portrait Gallery in London displays portraits of notable people and explores the history of portraiture. Wood’s turn towards painting her own face connects her work to a long tradition, while its everyday settings and references to online life place it in a contemporary context.
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Originally published by The Guardian as “Issy Wood: Self-Portraits review – suffocatingly revealing works from the ultimate zillennial painter”.