John Hurrell – 20 June, 2026

Within two galleries of the Gus Fisher Gallery, one can explore an extremely informative collection of over seventy historic photographs from the 1920s, ‘30s and early ‘40s, that showcases the creative activities of the romantically paired artists, Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore, two French women (originally named Lucy Schwob and Susanne Malherbe) who lived on the Channel Islands, situated just off the coast of Normandy.

A hundred years or so after it was made (and originally exposed mainly via publication), the work still looks amazingly fresh. Included amongst the vitrines and walls of photographs are contextual images of various important contemporaries like Andre Breton, and particularly Paris as it was between the two World Wars. And reproductions of publications and posters they worked on, linked to theatre productions.

Categorized art-historically as ‘Surrealist’ and/or ‘queer’, Cahun and Moore are memorable because they adopted male Christian names during the Nazi occupation and courageously carried out acts of resistance that sneakily undermined the invaders. They also produced the distinctive photographic self-portraits that make up this show and which, as celebrations of gay love, also indicate a love of theatricality and unabashed joyful narcissism.

Most of these androgynous images stylistically subvert conventional binary gender expectations. They usually feature unusual ‘male’ haircuts and wigs, plus exploit innovative decorative costumes, props like hollow word-covered dumbbells, and piercing unwavering stares reflected in mirrors. Their names always went together as working artists.

My personal favorites are of Cahun’s severed head placed in a bell jar as if in a laboratory. Vibrant with black humour, the four images (now posthumously printed large—something Cahun had expressed enthusiasm for) are cheekily confident and intense. You really get a sense of Cahun and Moore as having strong, forthright, charismatic personalities. Condemned to be executed by the Nazis the two women were very lucky to be saved by the fortuitous timing of the Liberation.

In my opinion it is one of best shows that the GF has ever presented. A cracker! One that is illuminating and deliciously dense. Accompanying it is the publication of In the Prow of Myself, an anthology of attempted descriptive and poetic interpretations by Jess Clifford, Amber Esau and Josiah Morgan.

However I have a bone to pick. Because these haunting female self-portraits are so powerful in their own right, texts cannot compete or be equivalent, for while the Cahun and Moore’s expressive shots of their own faces and bodies are admirably raw and never slick, the fact that none are reproduced in the accompanying little red book or folded yellow paper handout is a disappointment. There is an over abundance of words—too much god-damn art history and theory!—for the portrait images should be far more well known than they are. They need to be experienced in published portable reproduction alongside texts of commentary. As a more bodily form of celebration. Gut, Eye and Brain together. A heretical view perhaps, but true.

John Hurrell

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