In August of 2002 I had been looking at a whole lot of portraits by Amadeo Modigliani, and I was fascinated by the way that he flattened out the eyes of his subjects. So often the eyes are described as being the centre of expression, and indeed this woman looks rather blank, but I'm not so sure that it's because she doesn't have nicely modelled glistening globes of jelly in the front of her skull. I think it's more likely that she looks blank because her face has no expression. Modigliani himself, on the other hand, seemed to be able to manage facial expression quite nicely without eyes.