FRANCIS BRUGUIÈRE (1879-1945)

This photograph, which dates from approximately 1925, was taken by Bruguière in New York during the last year he worked on his first experimental film, The Way. The image is both powerful, dramatic and macabre, with five overlapping views of the sitter's face wearing a frenzied expression filling the frame.
Conceived as a film about different psychic states, The Way was never completed because its principal actor Sebastian 'Baron' Droste died unexpectedly during filming. The extraordinary stills from the film, however, are now recognized as the first surrealist works by an American photographer, coinciding with the publication in France of André Breton's first Surrealist Manifesto.