For the past 40 years, Sophie Calle (b. 1953, Paris) has been recognized for her photographical work, where she investigates common human experiences, such as feeling vulnerable and exposed. Paris features in many of her early works from the 1980s, serving as a backdrop for her artistic stagings of personal encounters. Calle’s work is a fine balance between documentary photography and performance art, allocating her a unique place in the international art world.
The Bonniers Konsthall exhibition contains two of Sophie Calle’s pieces: The Bronx and The Shadow. In 1981’s The Shadow, we trail behind the artist as she walks around Paris, secretly photographed by a detective. Sophie Calle’s mother hired the detective, having been asked by the artist herself to do so. The detective believed that the artist was unaware of his existence, whereas throughout the work Calle was in complete control, moving around the city in order to document her own existence. This piece proposes questions of control, of just who has the power over whom in the public sphere.
For The Bronx, 1980, Sophie Calle asked eight strangers living in this New York City borough to take her to each of their neighbourhoods. The pristine Parisian exteriors are replaced by shabby, battered, worn-down settings. Even though by all appearances the Bronx appears unwelcoming, the stories told by the strangers instil the work with hopes of a brighter future.