Left: Giovanni Battista Piazzetta (Italian, 1682-1754), Study of Eyes, Ears, Noses and Mouths, ca. 1750. Black chalk. Gift of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, 1961.12:38
Right: Emmet Gowin (American, b. 1941), Insect Toxic Stain Index, Bolivia, November, 2010. Archival digital inkjet print. Collection of Emmet and Edith Gowin
Since 1997, Gowin has been traveling to tropical forests in Central and South America to photograph nocturnal moths. When startled or disturbed, moths release a burst of bitter chemicals. Here, Gowin created a visual index of the stains his subjects left on the old bed sheet where they land.
The disembodied features in Piazzetta’s drawing verge on the expressiveness of a whole face but are scattered loosely on the page. Together, they point toward a human subject, but, like the moth stains, they can also be appreciated individually.