Claude Cahun: Beneath This Mask
Caroline Fisher reports:
The exhibition, Claude Cahun: Beneath This Mask might not be an obvious choice for the first presentation in a new space – NUA’s East Gallery has moved in good time for its involvement in the British Art Show 8 in summer 2016 – but it is a thoughtful show and worth a visit. It is an understated and simple presentation of a series of small black and white photographs where the initial impression belies the complexity of the images. Indeed, these are surely some of the most influential photographs of the 20th century.
Claude Cahun was born in France in 1894 and early in her career was allied to the Surrealist movement via André Breton. However during the 1920s she came to live in Jersey where most of these photographs were taken. The prints shown here were reproduced from the original prints, the negatives having been lost.
The images themselves had a huge influence on much of the art made about personal identity during the later 20th and early 21st centuries. Cahun was ahead of her time and blazed a trail that is both familiar and startlingly fresh.
The accompanying leaflet suggests links to artists such as Cindy Sherman, but her work also relates to contemporary artists Lucy Gunning (whose 1993 film, Climbing around my room, was seen at the Sainsbury Centre a couple of years ago) and Francesca Woodman, the American photographer who took her own life at the age of 22.
All of Cahun’s images in the exhibition are self-portraits and many show the artist playing with ideas of gender. She dresses androgynously, her hair is cropped and her body is boyish. There is a sense that she is pushing the boundaries of who and what she is, in terms of costume, body image and setting.
Many of the images are titled simply Self Portrait, in some Cahun is masked or adorned in theatrical costumes or make-up. In some of the photographs Cahun comes across as a theatrical, performative artist who is playing with her own identity and manipulating the viewer. She looks straight at the camera or sometimes
looks out at the viewer, knowingly, at an angle.
Je Tends Les Bas, 1931. Courtesy and copyright © Jersey Heritage
In other images there is a sense of her vulnerability- in one she is seen reclining, perhaps asleep on the shelf of an armoire. In this, as with several other images, there is a sense of claustrophobia and discomfort, she is like a child hiding from her parents. But the way Cahun positions herself in relation to the viewer is always calculated so that you feel distanced as well as drawn in- a very contemporary way of working. What is more, the power of these images is concentrated by their small size, an effective contrast with the clean white space in which they are hung.
The exhibition runs until Saturday 9 January, so catch it while you can and look out for future shows in this new space- the programme of upcoming exhibitions promises to be an exciting one.
East Gallery, Norwich University of the Arts, St Andrew’s Hill
Tuesday 10 November 2015 – Saturday 9 January 2016
