Claude Cahun was a spirit of rebellion and defiance. She was a defying conventional ideals of beauty and femininity with a shaven head and male attire, to her direct resistance of German occupying forces.

Claude Cahun was a Surrealist photographer whose work explored gender identity and the subconscious mind. The artist’s self-portrait from 1928 epitomizes her attitude and style, as she stares defiantly at the camera in an outfit that looks neither conventionally masculine nor feminine.

In this photo, Cahun deceives the audience because they dress up to look like a masculine man with a heavy weight in their hand, short hair, and male clothes like shorts with shirt. But in reality, the weight is fake, the hair is tied up behind so you can’t see it, so the overall photo deceives us, the audience.