Portraits of the 20 th Century Self: An Interartistic Study of Gertrude Stein's Literary Portraits and Early Modernist Portraits by Paul Cezanne, Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso

Building on previous comparisons between Gertrude Stein’s literary work and early modernist artwork, this interartistic study offers an in-depth examination of the structural and conceptual connections between Stein’s literary portraits and portraits created by Cézanne, Matisse and Picasso. These portraits reveal a continuing search for a means of portraying the Self, an incessant questioning of the Self – both in terms of identity and entity – and a relentless reflection on creating the Self anew in art. In the process of searching, Stein, Cézanne, Matisse and Picasso came to create portraits of the 20th century Self.