Grande Tête

Various twentieth-century painters and sculptors have turned their hands to designing and making jewelry, and their efforts have lent prestige to the concept of "art to wear." Two workshops, GEM MONTEBELLO, in Italy, and François Hugo, in France, collaborated with artists such as Man Ray, Pablo Picasso, and Max Ernst to produce special, limited-edition jewelry. Designed by the important surrealist artist Max Ernst, Grand Tête represents the friendship and collaboration between Ernst and metalsmith François Hugo. Beginning in 1959, Ernst brought various models in wax and plaster to Hugo's atelier to be translated into gold. The work presents the wearer with an abstract, almost nightmarish face, echoing Ernst's explorations of the subconscious in his sculpture and drawings.