Add to ORKGHow do we know who ourselves and the other are? What is it about an identity that allows us to situate it in a context that we can comprehend? Identification of an identity is the process by which we recognise certain markers that allow us to make the unknown known. This is, however, a most imperfect process. It depends on which elements of identity are most salient, which are themselves dependent on which referents we are predisposed to know and recognise. This paper posits that art can assist in understanding the constitution of identity. Art deals with characters from observation by decontextualising and reconstituting them in artworks. We thus find them retrieved, isolated, deconstructed and reconstructed, which opens new analytical pos...