Face by hand on a red background 

Editor: So, this is "Face by hand on a red background", a ceramic sculpture by Fernand Léger, currently residing in the Musée National Fernand Léger. The bold lines and flat colours give it a very graphic, almost poster-like quality. What catches your eye when you look at it? Curator: It feels like Leger is playfully disassembling the conventional portrait. It's all planes and angles, the face reduced to its most essential forms, like he’s trying to rebuild it in a totally new, maybe more honest, way. Editor: More honest? Curator: Yeah! The expression isn't some fleeting, perfectly captured moment, but a collection of simplified shapes – it's not trying to fool you with realism. The slightly raised surface gives the image dimensionality – more than just an image of a face, right? Plus the colour contrast… zing! What kind of emotional effect does that create, do you think? Editor: It's definitely eye-catching and dynamic. It almost feels a little unsettling though. I suppose that’s the caricature tag, right? It has such a cool directness… Not sure "pretty" is what Léger was going for, huh? Curator: I think you nailed it! More…challenging, thought provoking! It forces us to reconsider how we see and interpret faces, and beauty, really. Plus, consider the materials: using something as basic as ceramic elevates these humble materials in the name of fine art. Editor: Interesting. It's like Léger's inviting us to look beyond the surface, both of the art and of ourselves. I love how seemingly simple the piece is and how multi-layered its conceptual presence may be. Curator: Couldn't agree more! Thanks for your illuminating reading of this great piece, Editor.