Face Time Mural

With the “Face Time” mural Various & Gould are adapting their significant mix of screen-print and collage for the first time in a painterly manner to such a large scale. The 350 m² facade was developed in cooperation with the architects roedig . schop, is located on the border of Mitte and Kreuzberg and part of same titled series “Face Time”.

In their series “Face Time” Various & Gould deal with the subject of faces. However, they do not create portraits in the traditional sense but rather character studies in the form of collaged heads. Looking for individuals that do not exist in reality, the artist duo assembles varied facial parts inventing new characters along the lines of an identikit picture catalogue.

It all happens en face as the interaction of different facial expressions and gender, multicolored surfaces and rough dot patterns creates vivid characters who cast a spell over you. Only at second glance the particular elements can be detected and become gradually visible. Thereby the faces are always inherently consistent true to the motto “better contrasty and expressive than pretty and perfect”.

Various & Gould subvert with their dadaist patchwork identities common beauty ideals and celebrate human diversity. Even if their characters are fictional, they appear more authentic than many of the glossy beauty faces represented in the daily news.