Claude Cahun was an artist, photographer, and writer, but she was best known for her self portraits, where she dressed up as different characters. She was a surrealist photographer, and explored the themes of gender identity and subconscious mind as most of her art work and photography focuses on gender and identity, while also including aspects of theatre, as she dresses up as characters in front of the camera.

Her name was Lucy Schwob, born in 1984, Nantes France to wealthy Jewish Parents. She has a close connection to Jersey as she would regularly visit there during her holidays. Cahun then moved to Jersey in 1937, and found her passion for art as she began to experiment with radical styles and ideas. For example she refused to conform to gender normality, so she adopted a masculine appearance and used gender neutral pronouns to assert her own identity. This was also explored throughout her artwork and photography.

Her work she produced first, started to show an interest in surrealism, as she quickly became a part of an artistic community in Jersey. She started to produce a series of photomontages and photographs that challenges traditional ideas of gender, sexuality and identity.

Others would describe Claude Cahuns work as daring and provocative as it was greatly attracted by the Surrealist movement in Paris. This was thought as she explored a variety of guises, exploring a variety of different personas and identity. This provoked the viewers in ways which it challenges their assumptions on gender and identity, as it is not clear whether she is dressed man or woman.

Cahun’s most iconic work was produced in 1920s-1930s where she created a series of self portraits using herself. She presented herself in a variety of poses, exploring themes of gender fluidity and identity. She dresses as both male and female, bus also a genderless figure – this was done to challenge the viewers assumptions about gender identity.

“Under this mask, another Mask.”

I think what makes this photo interesting and engaging for the viewer is how Claude Cahun is posing into the mirror but looking away. It makes us as the viewer intrigued, as it draws you in creating the main focus points. We first see her in the portrait but then our attention is shifted to the portrait created in the mirror which gives this other very interesting and engaging focus point – this makes us look closer into the portrait. I think the choice of clothes and style Claude Cahun uses in this photo and in general gives the viewer this interesting perception of the photo making us think differently about her identity.

This self portrait from 1928 of Claude Cahun explains her attitude and style, as she stares directly into the camera, and dresses up as a neither masculine or feminine characters. I think Claude Cahun creates a really interesting concept about the portrait, because she engages the viewer in ways that challenges our own judgement of the gender identity.

It is interesting because when we see a portrait of something we can’t identify straight away, it makes us look closer. The way she dresses and poses, and also how we see the character, such as how we see her reflection in the mirror, makes the portrait very engaging, as we create our own judgement on the portrait.

I think this portrait of Claude Cahun is very interesting. Cluade Cahun experiments with identity expressing this with what she wears for example, the chequered jacket creates an interesting focal point. We get this impression that it is neither masculine or feminine as not only what she is dressed in gives us different assumptions but normally we would depict light and softer tones such as white or light grey to be more feminine, and the darker tones to be more masculine. This portrait makes the viewer question the identity of the subject, as Cahun doesn’t make it obvious whether it’s male or female, this is a way of her making engaged with the portrait as she wants you to work it out yourself. The quote ‘under this mask, another mask,’ is what Cahun uses to describe her photography. Claude Cahun communicates this as she creates two portraits of her. The first shows the mask, and the portrait in the mirror shows what’s beneath the mask.

Out of the three artists I picked I chose Collier Schorr as an artist reference, but first I need to analyse and find out more about his work.

About the photographer

Collier Schorr is an artist and fashion photographer who grew up in New York. Her work explores themes such as history, nationality, war and gender. She is most popularly known for her adolescent portraits which blend photorealism with elements of youthful fantasy.

Examples of her work

Americans

The photo has horizontal lines from what is believed to be metal bars on a wooden gate, the wood on the gate gives the background, of the photo in the middle, a rough texture.

The photo at the back of the montage is taken indoors and uses artificial light. in the photo it looks like there is a man with a hat playing snooker/pool. Having that photo at the back could imply that it is less important and there is a hierarchy in the photos as the photo of the cowboy is placed in the middle, drawing the attention.

The photo in the top left behind the middle photo has a yellow filter to it, you can’t really see what is happening in the photo but it does have a man with a hat in it.

The photo in the top right has a group of people standing possibly around something but you can’t tell what it is because the photo of the cowboy is covering it, the photo looks like it was taken at night with an artificial light possibly from a torch shining at them, however the light is not too bright that it affects the exposure of the photo.

For this photoshoot, I decided to photograph my both, male and female friends outside. I wanted them girls to pose in a way that they felt was comfortable to them. Above are all of the photos I took from this photoshoot. I decided to pick a day when the weather was snowing as it gave me the perfect opportunity to photograph girls and boys being themselves and show how their personalities and actions differ to express femininity and masculinity in adolescence.

My Favourite Photos

These photos are my favourite photos I took of the girls. Whilst asking them to pose how they could express their own personalities. My models decided to crouch, stand, smile and sit how they felt comfortable. This helped to convey the idea of wanting to feel confident in a photo whilst being surrounded by e.g. flowers. I edited these photos in Adobe Lightroom and increased mostly the:

• Shadows
• Brightness
• Warmth
• Sharpness

This was due to the bright and white colour of the snow reflecting on the camera. Whilst adjusting my camera settings I also had to focus on increasing the aperture. I increased my aperture to f/8 and the ISO to 200. This is because my camera’s light meter will see the bright snow as too much light which will cause it to underexpose my photos and and leave the snow looking a dull grey colour.

These photos are my favourite photos I took of the boys. I also asked them to pose how they could express their own personalities. However, they decided to pose whilst engaging with each other and having fun, which contrasts from the girls and how standing and smiling for the picture was more important that continuing what they are doing and enjoying their activities whilst being photographed. This method of photographing both girls and boys and seeing how they react, perfectly highlighted the theory of both gender’s usual qualities. For example, women tend to score higher than men on personality traits. These traits consist of agreeableness, openness to experience, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and extroversion. Women also mostly have a higher amount of traits of anxiety and sympathy, while men tend to be more assertive and risk-taking. This was shown through how they adapted to being photographed doing what they want to do.

In this photo, I asked a male and a female to pose how they felt comfortable with. The female model chose to smile, with a soft expression. This immediately creates a sociable, delightful impression of happiness, joy and content, which is usually the expression a teenage female will choose when they are being photographed. This is due to the fact smiling is seen as a way to capture a happy memory and socially acceptable behaviour. Women usually want to be seen as having a good time and possibly even putting on a facade that they are enjoying themselves to e.g. keep up a social status as fun and sociable.

The male model chose to not smile and have a more neutral or serious expression. This immediately creates an impression of masculinity and that serious face communicates strength and independence. It is said that many men throughout the world do not want to show any elements of vulnerability or joy that others can easily read meanings to, so a genuine smile is rare in a photo of adolescent boys, especially in solo photographs, due to social hierarchy of men on social media.

This photo would be my favourite image out of all, due to the fact of the contrast between the immediate reactions between males and females when being photographed, however the image is slightly blurry and therefore brings down the quality of the photo, to improve this, next time I will increase my shutter speed, this will help me to get a sharper images, without including any motion blur. I decided to attempt to remove the blur of the photo as much as I can in Adobe Lightroom however I did not succeed with a high quality image.