Is a selfie embarrassing? It depends on how you think about it. You could see it as peak narcissism, a shallow banality for a self-absorbed, phone-addicted era. And that could be true. But maybe it’s deeper than that?

For maybe 600 years, artists have used their own reflections to engage with questions of identity and mortality, image and perception. So you could also look at the selfie as an extension of the rich and complicated tradition of the self-portrait.

To us, a careful examination of that tradition reveals a surprising continuity between the lowbrow selfie and its more respectable elder sibling...

Head to The New York Times to read the rest and experience the exciting visual format they showed the work in. Artists featured in the piece include: Jan van Eyck, Cindy Sherman, Ana Mendieta, Zanele Muholi, Ai Weiwei, Yayoi Kusama, Molly Soda, Hannah Wilke and more.