The face and the eyes have always been in my opinion the strongest and most meaningful part of any painting involving a human figure. It stands as such a powerful anchor for any spectator to the image, and adds a bridge through which we get to connect.

But for a bit now I've been seeing myself experiment with faceless figures. I know I have just praised the face for being a reliable connection point with the viewer, but I've also found that removing it adds a whole other dimension with its respective strengths.

I think that while I've always enjoyed connecting with characters through their facial expression, it for the most part has always felt as if it's been missing something. At times it can feel somewhat volatile and be hard to connect with a figure if the image I'm looking at happens to be the only image in which said figure is depicted. My perception changes however when its a series of painting involving the same figure, or when the figure is a representation of someone that did truly exist and therefore grounds it more. So it's mostly an issue I get with fictional characters I believe, or characters with which I don't get enough time to connect because they're not being reused, which has been an underlying issue in my work I recon. I don't reuse characters, and I think that therefore removing what makes a character its own person (its face) is what may lead my work towards a more interesting path.

I'm sort of writing this as I go, I have many ideas in mind so I’ve got to organise them haha

But yeah, I feel that if your image is going to include a human figure, you’ve got to ground them as much as possible. You do that either by working in surrounding elements into your image, or if it is a series of painting, or it being a real person. I think yeah, if you're going to have a face, you want to make them feel real, otherwise you're better off removing the face as it is going to be the anchor point (we're human, we look for faces all around us) but it is not going to be as strong as it should.

Hopefully I make sense. But I also should clarify that this is just my perception, and that even if that's how I feel, its definitely not universal. As I'm typing this I keep thinking of examples of work that contradict what I'm saying, but there'll always be contradictions like those in art. The point is, I wanted to create a lead towards why I think removing faces is interesting in itself.

So my characters aren't real by any means, and I do not reuse them across my work, so I remove the face, great. But aside removing a point of weakness, does it add anything at all ?

And 3 things came to mind, aside the fact that removing what makes a painting weak makes it stronger, and in this case it sort of replaces itself with an intentional alternative.

First of, I feel as it renders the image a whole lot more relatable, simply through the fact that you're not personifying the character anymore, and it therefore doesn't stand as a person, but simply a human. It acts as the complete opposite of what a portrait is so powerful for. We can all relate to hands, legs, knees, elbows. But faces, the eyes, the nose, the second you tie those together they become deeply personal. I'll have to agree already however with the fact that morphology and skin colour will still stand in the way of universal relatability though. I do believe however that if within a series you include those differences, it then homogenises the entire works and renders it all relatable. We're therefore not talking about characters or specific people, but just people / humans. And I think that is very strong as well as a general solid anchor point.

Related to this first point, because the work becomes more general, it becomes more vague, and what is vague leaves more freedom when it comes to connection points. The spectator is free to find their own anchor point, and therefore they build their own narrative which results in a perception that feels so much more personal. And then again, whether you as an artist want said liberty when it comes to the perception of your work is up to you and how you built your project. If you're trying to stick to a strict narrative, you'd want a way around that.

For quite some time, I would write short texts that would accompany my paintings, they served as complementary texts. But as I developed my practice more, I started to really appreciate the vagueness that could sprout out. I've always been very literal with my depiction and meanings, and learning to let go has been extremely valuable. Maybe I'll eventually return to those poetry text works someday, but for now I rather want to come up with paintings that leave enough of a gap for the viewers to create their own texts. Really, your work becomes so much more meaningful when you let the spectator connect the missing dots.

And this leads towards my third point, weirdness and tension points. God, this has slowly become so important to me when it comes to art that I make or consume, it's addictive. Removing just enough elements for your work to barely showcase what is to be expected. When 97% of the image fits within your expectations but the remaining 3% happen to be rogue. And whether you do it for visual play, story telling or just style points, it doesn't really matter as long as it provokes a reaction. When you see a body, you automatically expect to see it's face, but when you don't, your brain happens to be itching a little. Those missing elements become tension points, they add mystery and ambiguity, which is a very powerful effect. Now I'm still trying to find a good balance when it comes to playing around with that. The more subtle it gets the better the effect I'd say. If I happen to be intentionally hiding something, then there has to be a reason for that. Tension points are becoming a primary point of interest when I build new works now, so I'm excited to see where I go with that.

This has felt very analytical, but I believed it would be a good exercise for myself to write down reflexions and researches I was going through, and thought why not just publish those for anyone to read.

I wrote this over the span of a couple weeks because it is just not yet a habit, but I don't think I'm going to edit it much although it could've been more loosely written.

As I slowly move towards canvas works for the most part, those are alley I'll be looking into exploring. Tension points that bring in vagueness, play with the body, all while remaining faithful to my sci-fi background as well as previous works. This feels like a genuine extension and honestly I'm very much looking forward towards future works.

Anyways, that's about it for this first post. I have many other topics I want to discuss, and I sort of want to write about them just head on, no draft, all while keeping it somewhat short. I think the length here is good.

If you got this far, I hope you were able to find at least one point of value somewhere. And if you have any reactions, reflexions, anything, you can reach out via email, or maybe I'll have a section bellow on the website, I'll see.

Thanks for reading !

- z