This book is published to accompany the exhibition under the same title held at Central Academy of Fine Arts Art Museum, Beijing, from 17th December 2010 to 20th February 2011. The exhibition features self-portraits painted by Chinese woman artists from 1920 to 2010. The exhibition is divided into two sections, each further divided into five sub-sections. A chronology of important events related to Chinese woman art from 1844 to 2009, compiled by Chinese Modern Art Archive, is included in the book.

The so-called “self image” refers to both the self-portrait in the narrow sense, in which the painter takes herself as the object of imitation, and the artist’s self-modeling and expression in the broad sense, including paintings, sculptures, and some composite material works, with the meaning of self-portrait and self-spiritual intention, i.e., works of art containing the artist’s self-narrative intention. The term “self image” here emphasizes not so much a certain type of portrait, but rather the meaning and manner of attributes—self-analysis, self-shaping, and self-naming.

Yao Daimei, born in 1959 in Shantou, Guangdong Province, graduated from South China Normal University and Sun Yat-sen University successively, and obtained her master’s degree and doctor’s degree in modern Chinese literature. From 1993 to 1999, she was the editor of Literature and Art Supplement of Nanfang Daily, and from July 1999 to the present, she has been an associate professor and professor of South China Normal University. She has been engaged in the research of modern Chinese literature history for many years, with main directions: research on the evaluation system of modern Chinese literature, research on the literature and culture of the Haikai school in the Republican period, and research on Chinese women’s literature and art in the 20th century.