English
The Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume in Paris is holding a retrospective of Claude Cahun until 25 September this year. The exhibition, curated by Juan Vicente Aliaga and Leperlier Francisco, is organized by the Jeu de Paume and co-produced with the Art Institute of Chicago and the Virreina Centre de la Imatge de Barcelona.
The retrospective devoted to the writer, actress and Surrealist photographer seeks to rescue the iconoclastic nature of her work which is almost unknown. Thus, after 16 years absence from the exhibition halls of France, Cahun’s art returns to the Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume to enable younger generations “to discover the work and challenges that this woman had to confront within the society of her time,” said Juan Vicente Aliaga.
The exhibition shows 140 works and documents that have been provided by the Pompidou Centre in Paris, the Institute of Modern Art Valeriano and the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra, plus pieces from a few private collections that have never been exhibited.
Lucy Renée Mathilde Schwob, Claude Cahun´s real name, was born in Nantes, France in 1894. Rebellious, anarchistic and revolutionary from a young age, she took the name of her uncle, Leon Cahun. She went on to break one of the taboos of early twentieth century conservative France by openly acknowledging her homosexuality. In 1920 she moved to Paris with her partner, Suzanne Malherbe (known by the pseudonym Marcel Moore), who shared her intellectual curiosity, and began writing for the Mercure de France.
Literature, theatre and photography ran through his veins, and she was bursting with ideas for transforming society completely. In 1929 she published her first photograph in the magazine Bifur. That same year she joined the Le Plateau theatre. A year later she published her first autobiographical essay Aveux non avenus, which includes photographic works that explore androgyny and non-stereotypical sexuality.
She participated in the Association of Revolutionary Writers with André Breton and Georges Bataille, and with them she also founded the magazine Conttre Attaque, in which they launched fiery attacks against Nazism and the fascism that was gripping Europe. Her unwavering fight for freedom led her to join the Resistance and take part in acts of sabotage, for which she was arrested and almost executed.
Despite her activism, her work is profoundly intimate and contains an erotic dimension that reveals the passion that shook her whole life. The curators of this exhibition leave us in no doubt that Cahun went much further than Duchamp in her aesthetic work. She was innovative with her aesthetic look at femininity and crossed borders as regards the relationship between her art, her politics and her life, giving eroticism and sexuality a key role in her work.
Despite being relatively well known in her time, the sexual nature of much of Cahun’s work contributed to her being ignored in subsequent years. Not until 1992, almost 40 years after her death, did her work begin to be studied once more. With a view to contributing to this revival, Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume have gathered this collection of her work in this excellent exhibition.
For more information: http://www.jeudepaume.org/index.php?page=article&idArt=1397&lieu=1
Nancy Guzman
Without a doubt, Claude Cahun was a wonderful artist who made her life itself into a work of art. You will have the chance to get to know her better if you come and rent apartments in Paris I promise you won´t regret it.
Translated by: Ben Palmer
