Pan's bronze self-portrait extends her long investigation of self-image into sculpture. A bust cannot rely on painted setting, clothing pattern, or atmospheric color. Identity is carried by mass, profile, surface, and the physical distance between object and viewer.
The work also records Pan's professional versatility. She had studied sculpture in Rome and returned to it for portraits and commissions in postwar Paris. Bronze places a Chinese woman artist within a durable public medium historically used to commemorate male authority.
