Profile A

Profile A presents a facial silhouette — the profile view that strips the face to its most essential linear form — as an exercise in abstraction. The profile in art history from Egyptian hieroglyphs to Greek coins represents the face's most characteristic line: the continuous contour from forehead through nose to chin that identifies an individual through pure shape. Amano's abstract treatment of the profile would have reduced this already-simplified view to its most geometric essence, eliminating modeling and detail to produce a composition of pure line and shape.