Marcel Bascoulard
(1913–1978)
BornVallenay, France
DiedAsnières-lès-Bourges, France
BiographyIn three decades of photographic self-portraits, Marcel Bascoulard posed in a series of dresses of his own design. His appearance changes gradually over the years—his shoulder-length hair greying and the wrinkles on his face becoming more defined—yet he presents himself nearly the same way in all of them: standing with a confident gaze directed into the lens, as if to say, this is who I am. The figure in this photographic biography differs from the one most people knew in Bourges, France, where he spent his adult life on the streets after a tumultuous childhood. Born in 1913 in nearby Vallenay, he was a teenager when his mother killed his father, and although he briefly studied art, his creative work would be made on the outskirts of society. Often unhoused or in marginalized lodgings, he sold or traded pencil and pastel souvenir drawings of historic sites in the medieval city to support himself and the cats he rescued.
Although he was arrested at least twice for wearing women’s clothing, including during the Nazi Occupation, he mostly wore the dresses, which ranged from demure Victorian styles to bold constructions in vinyl, when creating the photographs. Close friends operated the camera, and the backgrounds included interior spaces, city streets, and rustic settings, with Bascoulard regularly holding a mirror in his right hand. Even in public spaces, he is always alone, as if in an alternate world of his own creation layered over this one. He stated simply, “For the purpose of art, when I put on women’s clothing, I take my camera with me and have people I know take snapshots of me.”
Only one print of each self-portrait is known to exist. He made the photographs from the 1940s until 1978, when he was tragically murdered. A square in Bourges was named in his honor and a bronze bust of him was installed there, as he was then best remembered for his realistic city scenes. The private photographs did not come to wider light until years later. In 2021, Bascoulard’s self-portraits were featured in the American Folk Art Museum’s exhibition Photo Brut.
Allison C. Meier, 2025
Text written as part of “Rethinking Biography,” an initiative supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).