How to look at the genre of the self-portrait at a time when its place and purpose have been overlayed by the omnipresent narcissistic culture of the ‘selfie’? What can self-portraits tell us today about artists from more than a hundred years ago? Do they say more about the artist or about the time in which they were made? How did the emergence of the new medium of photography in the late 19th century change the (self-)portrait? How did artists wish to be seen and perceived by society in the turbulent 20th century? What does their stylisation in a self-portrait tell us about their character, beliefs and way of thinking? What strategies do contemporary artists use when presenting themselves? And can a self-portrait be a political issue? The answers to many of these questions can be found in works by artists such as Emil Filla, Bohumil Kubišta, František Kobliha, Vratislav Nechleba, Václav Stratil and Milena Dopitová from the GASK collection.