What Is The Importance Of Selfies?

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Selfies have gained immense popularity worldwide due to their modern convenience, and these photographs share a similar nature to that of painted self-portraiture: they are intended to reveal and/or conceal certain attributes about the subject, and the subject controls the creation of the piece itself. Selfies are often accused of not being art for their self-obsession, but they are not necessarily inherently narcissistic just as self-portraiture is not intrinsically egotistical.
“Selfie” could be considered a synonym for a self-portrait created through the medium of photography, for the similarities between painted self-portraits and selfies are undeniable. Artists create self-portraits for a multitude of reasons: are they depicting themselves …show more content…

The simple answer is convenience. Painted self-portraits would be completed in months to years, while a selfie can be taken in less than a second. Modern selfies are usually produced with smartphones or webcams, and the introduction of the front-facing camera on the iPhone in 2010 assisted in this convenience. Prior to smartphones and computers, self-portrait photography was created through box cameras. Kodak spearheaded the popularity of selfies in the 19th century with the release of the box camera: consumers would simply point the camera at a mirror or at themselves and wait for the photo to process. Daguerreotypes were portraits taken earlier than the Kodak camera was introduced, around 1840, and were usually small and on a polished metal surface. Robert Cornelius is believed to have taken the first selfie through a …show more content…

Why are we capturing an image of ourselves? Taking a photograph of oneself is not a new phenomenon: the act has existed over centuries. Its resilience to the passage of time could be because of the desire people have to express themselves - the very art of self-expression has existed for much longer than photography itself through self-portraiture. In fact, the purposes of self-portraiture and selfies are practically one and the same. Both can be premeditated with the intent of analyzing one’s own flaws, or concealing any perceived defects, and the two practices of self-representation are controlled by the subject. Selfies and self-portraits share more similarities than they

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