Polymer Faces

Did you know that faces will always be the most prominent element in any work of art? Yes, our eye will always go to the face or faces in any artwork, photograph, or space that we walk into. It is ingrained in us to look at the faces of people or creatures that we see before us. Survival dictated that we look at and read those faces to assess potential danger or to otherwise understand, as best we can, their purpose for being present. So if you have a face in your work, it is going to be a focal point.

This also makes the use of faces rather dramatic so if you choose to put a face in your work, just keep in mind that it will have a very strong draw for your art and will diminish the importance of everything else that goes with it.

This lovely, intricately decorated necklace is one such example. It generally takes a while for the eye to be drawn away from the face and move around the rest of the piece. Initially, you take in everything else but the face all at once. But this doesn’t mean that you can’t have all kinds of complex and busy work around the face while the face acts as a resting point. That is what Valeria Belova has done here.  The Labradorite and colorfully metallic feathers do their best to compete but the eye is always drawn back to the face.

This is actually one of her less detailed pieces but you rarely see a three-quarter view of the face in jewelry so I just had to share it. Not being straight on makes it a less dramatic presentation of a face, pushing us to think more about the possible story behind it. I don’t know that this is polymer because she talks about the technique more than the material, but it absolutely could be. If you like this, you should take a look at the rest of her work and her LiveMaster shop, where faces from all positions are intricately set in jewelry pieces.