LE FRONT – THE FOREHEAD

1934 -1936

Medium : Iron, cast, welded, cut, cut, bent.

Dimensions : 19 x 13,2 x 3 cm

« Le Front (The Forehead) » is a sculpture in forged, welded and cut iron, executed by Julio González between 1934-1936.  It is composed of two parts: a roughly semi-circular, jagged-edged piece of sheet iron and a perpendicular, rectangular iron element.  Both are attached to a vertical iron rod, the semi-circle hanging above and in front of the perpendicular rectangle, forming a T-shape that resembles a forehead and a nose.  The lateral angles of the forehead are bent backwards to mimic the volumes of a head.

The face is the subject of González’s early metallic reliefs in repoussé copper or iron, like “Masque de face (Frontal mask)” (1912, fig. 1).  This naturalistic depiction of a woman’s face, in which the T-shape of the forehead and nose figures prominently, is dominated by soft curves and rounded volumes.

At the beginning of the 1930s, González executes a series of metallic masks which offer innovative interpretations of the face, influenced by the art of non-Western societies, including African masks.  These were appreciated by González and his avant-gardist contemporaries in Paris for their perceived simplicity and direct, emotional charge, which they sought to apply to their own creation in hopes of revolutionizing Western art.

“The Forehead” pursues this line of research.  The face is reduced to its T-shaped core, whose sharp angles and jagged edges vaguely outline the contours of the eyebrows, but leave the rest to the viewer’s imagination. The enigmatic quality of the work is further accentuated by its frontal presentation, which recalls the noble impassivity of Egyptian sculpture, another influence for González.

“The Forehead” juxtaposes innovation and tradition, the explicit and the implicit, expressivity and mystery.  In spite of its apparent simplicity, this work drawing from a web of artistic references transcends its context and connects with the universal.