Christophe Lima - C to the L Power

The self portrait that I have created is framed by some of the toxic self-talk and anxieties that I have experienced within the past few years or so. The subjects of death, fear, rejection, and guilt are things that do not allow me to think or feel free within myself. In fact, they have the capacity to stop me from being who I am supposed to be. They are limiting in the same way that a window or frame can limit your field of vision. Luckily for the subject of this piece of art, and for me in real life, I have a courageous aspect to myself who can break through these anxieties, which I am doing in the literal sense in this piece. This is the part of me that is protecting me from myself and perhaps some of the other pains in life. The superhero that you see is a defense mechanism that has been honed overtime to sabotage the negative parts of my thought process. Without the superhero part of my persona, the rest of me would not exist. It is a good thing in one sense, but can alienate me (the superhero) in another; no one really gets to know a superhero. The viewer can get a good look at who I really am (or at least who I think I am at the moment) by flipping the superhero mask up. They will see my real face, and then if they open the head and torso, they will see my core. Inside they will see a huge heart growing out of a blooming tree, connected to a complex green system up top. This is the real me. This is how I really feel about myself. At my core, I am a very caring (heart), strong human being (tree). I am also very intelligent (green system), and feel like I am in a time in my life where I am really growing and coming into my own (the flowers). I’d also like to note the humor in this piece. I use humor because it makes light of some potentially dark subject matter, and because I learned that being able to laugh at yourself, and your crazy, is very important to personal growth.