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The apostle's face with its protruding eyes, low forehead, firm nose and projecting lower jaw, under the cap of short, tightly curled hair, is not very far removed from Gallo-Roman stele images. Its formal simplicity is accentuated by the manner in which the head is reserved against the cut-away background, the face lacking any interior modelling but handled rather as a single rounded mass. Although it is in relief, the figure is without a true third dimension, which could have been obtained only by presenting a succession of planes modulating the forms in space, or by a greater naturalism. Psychological analysis and naturalism are sacrificed in favour of monumentality - an approach to the human figure indicating a primitive or archaic phase in art.
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