BOSTON - Advertising and documentary photographer Elliott Erwitt once said, “The whole point of taking pictures is so you don’t have to explain things with words.”
He might have been describing two intriguing exhibits about portrait photography at the Museum of Fine Arts that have more in common than meets viewers’ eye.
Organized to complement the groundbreaking examination of British painter Lucian Freud’s self-portraits, “Elsa Dorfman: Me and My Camera” and the group show “Personal Space: Self-Portraits on Paper,” have used self-portraiture to express their varied identities in unpredictable ways.
Willie Cole’s photo etching “Man Spirit Mask” uses household items like a steam iron to create a mirror image of half his face marked with African scarification and ritualistic tattooing to forge a powerful meditation on race and identity.