THE FACE FIXATION

From a Stone Age Venus and an Egyptian death mask to an unflinchingly challenging 21st-century sculpture, Fay Bound-Alberti introduces seven depictions of the face that track humanity's ever-evolving relationship with creativity, hierarchy and self-image

- Fay Bound-Alberti

The art of darkness

This enigmatic head is a 25,000-yearold testament to the innate urge to capture the essence of a person in art

In 1894, an archaeologist called Édouard Piette walked into a cave in the village of Brassempouy in south-west France and came face-to-face with humanity's distant past.

Lying in the darkness was a fragment of mammoth-ivory carved to depict a head. That head was tiny - so small that it could nestle in the palm of Piette's hand - and yet it had survived for 25,000 years, carved by an artist deep in the Palaeolithic period. Piette couldn't have been aware of it at the time, but he had just discovered one of the earliest known representations of a human face in art.

That representation is both awe-inspiring - and deeply enigmatic. It would soon be known as 'The Venus of Brassempouy' there were other Venuses in the same cave, with those rounded hips and breasts associated with fertility symbols – and yet we can't even be sure if it depicts a woman.

Despite these uncertainties, the fact that this rare and portable object exists at all tells us that it was important for the artist to capture something of the essence of a person - and with a level of detail that is unusual for a Venus figurine. That depth of detail is most evident in the intricate, chequerboard-patterned hair - possibly a wig or hood - from which the object derives its nickname, 'La Dame à La Capuche' (Lady with the Hood). The face, by comparison, is a blank canvas. It has a prominent forehead, nose and brow, but it lacks a mouth. Was this artistic decision influenced by convention? Religion? Personal style? Time? We do not know.