Suzanne Malherbe
| Marcel Moore | |
|---|---|
Moore by Claude Cahun
|
|
| Born |
Suzanne Alberte Malherbe July 19, 1892 Nantes |
| Died | February 19, 1972 (aged 79) Jersey |
| Resting place |
St Brelade's Church 49°11′03″N 2°12′10″W / 49.1841°N 2.2029°W |
| Nationality | French |
| Known for | Illustrator, designer, and photographer |
| Movement | Surrealism |
Marcel Moore (19 July 1892 – 19 February 1972), born Suzanne Alberte Malherbe, was a French illustrator, designer, and photographer. She, along with her romantic and creative partner Claude Cahun, was a surrealist writer and photographer.
Moore was born Suzanne Alberte Malherbe in Nantes, France on 19 July 1892, and studied at the Fine Arts Academy in Nantes. In 1909, at age seventeen, Malherbe met fifteen-year-old Lucie Schwob and began a lifelong artistic collaboration. Malherbe's widowed mother married Schwob's divorced father in 1917. Curator Tirza True Latimer has theorized that this step-sister relationship not only encouraged the young ladies' creative collaborations but also diverted attention from their lesbian relationship. Between 1920 and 1937, they lived in Paris, where they became involved with the surrealism movement and contributed to avant-garde theater activities. They took gender-neutral pseudonyms: Malherbe became Marcel Moore, and Schwob became Claude Cahun. Cahun described Moore as "l'autre moi" (the other me), and they remained together until Cahun's death in 1954.
In her early twenties Moore worked as a graphic designer, producing ornate illustrations influenced by the japonism trend and the Paris fashion scene of the 1910s. Her modern fashion designs were published in the newspaper Phare de la Loire, owned by the Schwob family. She also collaborated with the poet Marc-Adolphe Guégan, producing illustrations for two of his books: L'Invitation à la fête primitive (1921) and Oya-Insula ou l'Enfant à la conque (1923).
Marcel Moore is best known as Claude Cahun's collaborator. Cahun's photographic oeuvre, all but forgotten for a few decades, was rediscovered in the 1980s and interpreted as a predecessor of Cindy Sherman's theatrical self-portraits. However, recent scholarship suggests that Moore was not only a muse but also had an active hand in the creation of some of Cahun's best-known works. In an essay for the 2005–2006 exhibition Acting Out: Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore at the Frye Art Museum in Seattle, curator Tirza True Latimer argues that Claude Cahun's own photographs are not so much "self-portraits" as collaborations with Marcel Moore. At times, the women photographed each other posing alternately in the same tableau. Moore's shadow is visible in some photographs of Cahun, making visible her own role behind the camera.
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