This self-portrait by Bryan Lewis Saunders shows his "normal face," but the other 8,000-plus images he's created over the past 16 years go into some pretty strange territory.
Drugs: Psilocybin Mushrooms
"I wanted to see how drugs changed my self-perception," Saunders said. "So I drew myself under the influence of a wide variety of them."
Drugs: Bath Salts
A self-portrait of Saunders after taking bath salts.
Third Ear Experiment, No. 2
Another self-portrait from the Third Ear Experiment series.
Third Ear Experiment, No. 1
"For 28 days I blocked up my external ears and attached a copper funnel to my mouth in an effort to connect my Eustachian tubes to my pineal gland by physically rerouting the way in which sound entered my body," Saunders said of the Third Ear Experiment series.
I'm All Out Of Hair, I'm So Lost Without You, No. 1
"I shaved my body hair and used it in my self-portraits to make e-cards letting people know how much I missed them." Saunders said.
I'm All Out Of Hair, I'm So Lost Without You, No. 2
Another body-hair-inspired piece.
Died: Great Aunt
Saunders describes his Died series as capturing "the difference between when a stranger or family member dies." This image was inspired by the death of his great aunt.
Died: Neighbor
Another self-portrait in theDied series, this time inspired by a deceased neighbor.
Naked Yoga: Casa Setu Bandha Sarvangasana
"I tried to do yoga and was using art as an incentive, but I think I waited too late in life to start," Saunders said of his Naked Yoga series.
My Drawings Aren't Messed Up, It's the Symmetry of My Face, No. 1
"Using the golden ratio and other ideas from geometry, I was trying to locate the precise imperfections of my face," Saunders said.
My Drawings Aren't Messed Up, It's the Symmetry of My Face, No. 2
Another self-portrait Saunders did based on the proportions of his face.
Facing Fear: Heights
"I wanted to use art to overcome some of my fears, so I drew myself while facing them," Saunders said of the portraits he did about confronting his fears. "A sort of 'exposure therapy.'"
Facing Fear: Trains
Saunders facing his fear of trains.
Popular Toys, No. 1
"From time to time I use art to revitalize myself," said Saunders of his Popular Toys series, in which he uses iconic playthings "to help bring out my inner child." This one is the artist as Mr. Potato Head.
Popular Toys, No. 2
This image in the Popular Toys series depicts a My Little Pony toy.
Psycho-Anatomy, No. 1
"Finding and connecting the similarities between different organs in the body," Saunders said of hisPsycho-Anatomy series. This image depicts the digestive system.
Psycho-Anatomy, No. 2
This image in Saunders' Psycho-Anatomy series depicts the brain.
Quitting Smoking, No. 1
"I wanted to see how quitting smoking changed my self-perception," Saunders said of the Quitting Smoking series. "I think I lasted a month before I started again."
Quitting Smoking, No. 2
Another self-portrait from the Quitting Smoking series.
Sensation Drawings: Ear Nibbles
"[This is] A project I did with my girlfriend to see how different and similar we felt the same physical sensations in or on our bodies," Saunders said of his Sensation Drawings series.
Sensation Drawings: Tummy Caresses
A self-portrait from Saunders' Sensation Drawings series based on the feeling of a stomach caress.
As of this moment, Bryan Lewis Saunders has drawn 8,628 self-portraits. By the end of the day, he’ll have completed 8,629. And although he’s recently become known as the guy who draws under the influence of drugs, his creations have been inspired by everything from death to body hair over the years.
“All day every day, images and feelings of the world come into me and it’s inescapable,” said Saunders in an e-mail to Wired. “So I thought if I did a self-portrait every day for the rest of my life, with no rules, the world and I could be more linked to my nervous system. And I could die knowing that I tried to experience as much as possible while I was alive.”
Saunders, a 43-year-old Virginia native who currently lives in Tennessee, comes off looking like the art world’s Louis C.K. in his wildly diverse images. He began his self-portrait experiment on March 30, 1995, after an art-history class discussion about the prevalence of artists who put themselves into images of the world around them. He didn’t entirely agree with that tack, so he flipped the concept on its head. (See his “normal face” self-portrait, which is the first image in the gallery above.)
Over the years, he’s created self-portraits based on love, the loss of family members and neighbors, his attempts at quitting smoking and the time he shaved off his body hair. And even though he’s not a “brony,” he once drew inspiration from My Little Pony. In the process, the amazingly prolific artist has opened a weird little window into life in modern America.
For the series based on his experiments with recreational and prescription drugs, he took everything from cocaine and Abilify to cough syrup and computer duster, then drew while under the influence. The resulting self-portraits range from intricately beautiful (psychedelic mushrooms) to insanely brutal (bath salts).
He’s undertaken other strange adventures as well, using the unusual experiences to generate unique imagery. “For 28 days I blocked up my external ears and attached a copper funnel to my mouth in an effort to connect my Eustachian tubes to my pineal gland by physically rerouting the way in which sound entered my body,” he said of his Third Ear Experiment.
“Only a severe stroke or coma could stop me from completing the self-portrait-a-day work.”
To date, Saunders has filled stacks of sketchbooks with his drawings — some days he does as many as nine of them. For the first decade of the project, the self-portraits were his primary artistic outlet. (In addition to drawing, Saunders now also does spoken word and performance art, and collaborates with musicians).
He doesn’t have any plans to stop cranking out the creative images. “Only a severe stroke or coma could stop me from completing the self-portrait-a-day work,” Saunders said.
Even though he’s had offers over the years to show his self-portraits at galleries, he’s been wary to hand them all over for fear of losing his life’s work. (He once had an entire exhibition stolen and had another sculpture vandalized during a show.) However, a collection of his drug-influenced self-portraits will be on display early next year at La Maison Rouge in Paris.
