Eschewing the digital processes favoured by many modern photographers, Polish artist Sophie Thun (b.1985) is committed to traditional analogue photography. In photomontages of varying scales and complexities, she explores themes of female objectification, eroticism and the politics of sexuality. She regularly uses herself as a subject, often appearing nude as in the early self-portrait Extension 8 x 12 where her body is partially concealed by a large field camera. In Shifted (KJ MF MS AG FW LM AS EW) she is lying in bed, wrapped in a duvet that covers most of her naked body. Here, she subverts the clichéd notion of women as passive objects of the male gaze; as indicated by the shutter release she grasps in her hand, the artist is in control of her own representation.

Other works result from hours spent experimenting in the darkroom. In Orientalischer Hamam & Sauna E-Fit, 18.07.2019, FL and Friedrichstrasse 12 (Werkstatt), 30.04.-25.06.2020, KJ, Thun splices together multiple images to create the illusion of sexual encounters with herself. Performing acts of desire for the camera in hotel rooms and museum buildings, she becomes both exhibitionist and voyeur, at once dominating and being dominated. These uncanny and impossible encounters are typically framed by ghostly hands – photograms she creates by placing her hands onto photographic paper during exposure.

Thun’s images belong to a centuries long tradition of female self-representation in European art and many of her images directly reference this history, particularly the technique of mise-en-abîme (picture within a picture), employed by women painters such as Catharina Van Hemessen (1528–c.1588), Rosalba Carriera (1675–1757), and Anna Waser (1678–1714). In her use of photomontage, however, Thun seeks to divorce the notion of truth from representation, prompting reflection on the veracity of the flood of media images we encounter daily.