The “Private” Photographs of Bolette Berg and Marie Høeg (ca. 1895–1903) — The Public Domain Review

While their commercial work consists of the posed portraits and conventional landscapes typical of their time, Berg and Høeg’s private archive is alive with experiments in the presentation of gender. Berg seems shyer and is more often behind the camera than in front of the lens, while Høeg tends to blow it up: she playfully counts stacks of legal tender while wearing a neckerchief; poses with her hand on a military dagger, neck framed by a frilly tunic; and stares stoically ahead, wrapped in the furs of a polar explorer. Like Sølvi Bennett Moen notes“Høeg appears more traditionally feminine when she acts as a (clearly fictional) man, and more traditionally masculine in appearance – with her close-cropped hair and deadpan expression – when she acts as a woman on camera.” Many of these images are also comments on social class, ‘a signal of respect for the middle class’, say Emma Lewis. Sometimes friends and family join in. In one ensemble, the cross-dressing of Høeg and her brother Karl, he hung from her kind arm while wearing a hat and skirt with feathers; in another, teachers Ingeborg Berg, Julie Antonsen and Trine Ulriksen drink liquor, lost in a card game, while Høeg grins mischievously at the camera and uncorks another bottle.