“… I have never been aware before

how many faces there are.

There are quantities of human beings,

but there are many more faces,

for each person has several.”

Rilke -Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge

The Greek word for face is prosopon. 

It came, for obvious reasons, to mean person. 

To see a face is to see a person.

From birth it is the face, rather than anything else,

that grabs our attention.

There are times when faces reveal and times when they conceal.

At all times the face of the other challenges me,

forces itself on my attention.

In Levinas’ words – I am not an ‘unto-myself’,

but a ‘standing-before-the-other’.

The other evokes a response,

makes a claim on my existence.

We are linked.

I cannot be indifferent.

To some extent I am responsible.