Cindy Sherman was the selfie pioneer – we could learn a lot from her originality

Sherman has spent her life masquerading as other people

Sherman uses costumes, wigs and clever make-up to transform herself into a huge range of characters (AFP/Getty)

Cindy Sherman is one of the most enigmatic visual artists working today. Her major show at London’s National Portrait Gallery confirms her status as queen of the selfie.

At the exhibition opening, people were wandering around, trying to work out which one of the several hundred people present was the artist herself (her true identity has always been utterly submerged in her work).

Sherman has spent her life masquerading as other people. Long before Instagram and airbrushing, Sherman was using costumes, wigs and clever make-up to transform herself into a huge range of characters, turning them into great art which cleverly commented on modern life. She has played at being a movie star in black and white, a society dame, a sexually ambivalent teenager and a beggar.