art without faces
Recently, I noticed that a lot of the art I like doesn't feature human faces. There are either none at all, or the faces are obscured or mask-like, with very limited features.
There's something fascinating about an artist being able to convey a mood, evoke an emotion, or even tell a story without relying on the human form. Humans are all around us, we see faces everyday. And when they're shown in a painting, we instinctively lock onto them. Faces become a shortcut to meaning. Is the person sad? Well, then the painting probably depicts sorrow. Does the face look angry? That must mean the painting is about rage. It can also be a shortcut on the artist's side. Want your picture to look "nice" and attract a lot of easy attention? Just put a beautiful face (usually a woman's face) on it.
But when there aren't any easy identifiers, the meaning or message instantly becomes more indirect, ambiguous, and even mysterious. I feel like these paintings offer more room for interpretation and introspection. Is this picture of a tree "just that" (a naturalistic depiction), a symbol of the artist's mental condition, a loved one, or society as a whole? Or is it not so much about what it's meant to depict, but what association it evokes in me?
In the past, when creating art myself, I've often taken the shortcut through faces. I might not completely abandom them, but I think I want to focus more on the indirect storytelling that "faceless art" makes possible.