Review of Gillian Wearing and Claude Cahun: Behind the Mask, Another Mask at the National Portrait Gallery

13/03/17

Gillian Wearing and Claude Cahun: Behind the Mask, Another Mask

National Portrait Gallery

9 March - 29 May 2017

Exploring gender, identity and the shifting notion of self in one’s artwork, especially through photography and the “selfie”, might be de rigueur at the moment, but a century ago, when the French artist and writer Claude Cahun (née Lucy Renée Mathilde Schwob, 1894-1954) began to do so, she was alone in the field. Although only one of her photographs was shown during her lifetime, Cahun began experimenting with photography and self-portraiture as early as 1912, working together with her partner (and later step-sister), Suzanne Malherbe (who also changed her name to the equally androgynous Marcel Moore). Fashioning masks and costumes to masquerade as women, men, and everything in between – Cahun herself wrote: “Masculine? Feminine? It depends on the situation. Neuter is the only gender that suits me” – she explored the construction of identity, decades before Judith Butler’s theorising on its performativity in Gender Trouble (1990). After time spent in Paris amidst the Surrealist movement – André Breton described Cahun as “one of the most curious spirits of our time” – Cahun and Moore settled on Jersey in 1937, where they went on to launch a resistance movement against the Nazis, before being imprisoned and sentenced to death in 1944 for counter propaganda tracts. Both attempted suicide but were taken to hospital and survived. They were released in 1945, on the eve of liberation. Much of Cahun's work had been destroyed by the Nazis, but she continued to experiment with photography until her death at the age of 60.

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Portfolio: Jane Moore

21/02/15

Portfolio: Jane Moore

Every 1st January, Jane Moore makes a New Year’s Resolution. “They normally consist of giving up chocolate or starting a new sport and I stick to them until about March,” she laughs. “In January 2014, I decided to make a resolution that I would be dedicated to and that was to keep a Sketch A Day journal.” And a sketch a day she did, A5 size in a Moleskine sketchbook, even when feeling ill or having impending work deadlines.

With a degree in Fashion Promotion and Illustration and some distinguished clients to her name (think i-D magazine, RSA Films, Barclaycard and the Royal Academy of Arts, to name but a few), the fashion influence is apparent in Moore’s drawings, including, for example, 26/08/14: Piers Atkinson Cherry Headband. “I used to work with Piers in the fashion team of Disorder magazine before he became a superstar milliner,” says Moore. “I am a great admirer of his work and I knew the red cherries would look fantastic against the graphite.”

There are many other sources of inspiration, however, taken from everyday surroundings, current jobs, current affairs, public figures, family, a life drawing class, books and theatre. Androgyny and gender identity also feature heavily.

Moore recently held a successful exhibition of her sketches at Shapes, Hackney Wick. She also took part in the Winter Pride Visual Arts Awards last November and her works were among those stolen during the ceremony at Tobacco Dock. “It was really upsetting,” she admits, “as I put my heart and soul into the drawings and they were seven of my best, including my self-portrait. Hopefully the thieves will do the right thing and return them. I don’t want to prosecute, I would just like my artworks back as they mean so much to me. However, I haven’t let it affect my work. I took it as a bizarre compliment and continued on with the project!” In fact, Moore has become so involved that she has now decided to continue throughout 2015 as well. Watch this space!

www.sketchadayproject.com

To see the full portfolio and enjoy the images, please see the March 2015 print issue of DIVA magazine