Self-portrait allows Anne Voeffray to show her body as an enigma. In revelation,it hides as much as it shows. It springs forth from the depths, consumed by shadows that light up, more or less in the undulation of fabrics, of disturbing transparencies or by the “imperfections” that the artist has taken care to apply to her own image. The questioning that begins is much deeper than that of sensuality. Distanced by the impression of closeness, the body offers and refuses itself at the same time. But, if different types of veil surround her face it is not to concede to the demanding virginity of nuns or, conversely, the dreadful humility of dishonoured girls.
Each “self” renders simultaneously the private and public facets. Privacy does not remodel itself according to nature, it enriches itself by the superimposition of sometimes incompatible strata. It can search for the image of another woman who perhaps we would have known or less obviously dreamt about. The ambiguous look at the equally ambiguous status of femininity that is always called clarity by a greedy society also springs up.
At the heart of a genre apparently “framed” the work doesn’t seek to achieve a “perfect time” but, like saving water, rather a fragmented time where the artist shatters the deception. It has a name, It is existence. Existence naked and complex. It’s also within the opposite of a self-portrait: in praise of the secret. It allows the artist to go into the concept of femininity beyond the charming and the decorative by using diversionary tactics.
