Self-Portrait, 1955
Wrapped in his familiar brown jacket and red scarf, with a gaunt face, bristly beard, and graying hair, the artist appears with a sad, lost gaze. He evokes a condition of profound existential isolation, echoed by the solitary crow crossing the evening sky. In the background, a wheat field seems to envelop the figure, while a thin line of vegetation completes the perspective.
From the medical records of his first hospitalization at S. Lazzaro in Reggio Emilia, we learn that violence and self-harm were among the most evident pathological manifestations. The traces of these wounds appear in nearly all of the artist’s self-portraits. The wound or scar on the right temple often marks his face with the sign of a suffering perceived as liberating—a daily ritual meant to release mysterious harmful fluids, according to those close to him.
The representation is linear, with the wound offered to the viewer almost as if before a camera lens. The image is austere, the pose nearly anti-artistic, resembling the standardized posture of an ID photograph. There is no explicit violence here, but rather an anxiety for inner recomposition. Violence is entrusted to the animal battles; in his own image, Ligabue consistently offers an iconography of calmness and rigor.