Veiled Face

Veiled Face

Faceless Head No.005
  • Dimensions: 25 × 35 cm
  • Materials: Terracotta, natural pigments, rust
  • Year: 2015
  • Availability: Unique piece
  • Price: Upon request
Artistic Statement of the Head

This face appears buried under layers of matter, as if veiled by the sediment of time. Its faint features barely emerge, suggesting a being struggling to reveal itself through opacity. The rough, mineral-like surface reinforces the impression of a fossilized face, frozen in an ancient memory.

Artistic Statement of the Collection

The 100 Faceless Heads series explores what remains of humanity when identity becomes uncertain. Each head, marked by erasures and traces, embodies the tension between disappearance and persistence.

Symbolism

This head symbolizes the veil of oblivion, yet also the strength of memory resisting erasure. It embodies the fragile yet resilient human presence within the flow of time.

The “100 Faceless Heads” Collection

A sculpted memory, a universal story

The “100 Faceless Heads” collection brings together one hundred unique sculptures, hand-shaped in terracotta and rusted metal. These works embody the invisible faces of our collective history: undocumented migrants drowned at sea, victims of slavery, the forgotten of genocides, the nameless whose memories fade away.

Each of these heads, deliberately devoid of features, symbolizes a life, a past, a suspended story. Faceless, they become the silent bearers of individual and collective memories, inviting us to reflect on our shared humanity.

A committed and universal message

Through this series, the artist calls on us to recognize these erased lives and to rebuild bridges between past and future. “I raise a glass to the undocumented who perish in seas and deserts, I denounce the macabre thunder of cannons and wars…” he declares, expressing the emotional and political power of this work.

“100 Faceless Heads” is far more than an art collection: it is a sculptural photo library, a call to memory, to dialogue, and to a deeper understanding of our common roots.

Gustave Akpéhou DJONDA

Self-taught Visual Artist

Passionate about collective memory and questions of identity, the artist works with clay and metal to give form to what is often invisible or forgotten. Through the series “100 Heads Without Faces,” he offers a space for reflection and dialogue on the wounds of the past and the hopes for a more just future.

Comme un poisson dans l’eau, exposition environnementale

2016
|
Lomé, Togo

Les Géants se lèvent, l’Afrique avance

2012
|
Lomé, Togo

Ce Rouge qui m’appartient

2000
|
Lomé, Togo