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“There is a crack in everything—that’s how the light gets in.” ~ Leonard Cohen, Anthem

A crack in the artist’s (fundamentally illusory) sense of control can let in the clear light of creative flow. Which is what happened with One Voice, when Bruvel envisioned a pedestal piece whose humorously grimacing smile—inspired by the grinning portraits of contemporary Chinese artist Yue Minjun—might dispel the darkness of a difficult moment in his own life. But the piece wasn’t working out. So Bruvel deconstructed and reconstructed it with abandon, allowing the design’s own fluid momentum to lead the way. The result is a richly complex image in which the figure’s serene half-smile is twice mirrored, capturing an inverse expression and then once more its original tranquil tilt. As such, it also speaks of emotions that might be contained in the opposite of a quiet smile. Yet as the title suggests, this is one mouth, one voice expressing multiple, exquisitely subtle levels of meaning at once.