Adam Broomberg, CAConrad, Gersande Spelsberg, Glitter in My Wounds, 2021

Glitter in My Wounds is the result of a series of chance encounters. It embraces accident and improvisation in the face of the restrictive categories that pervade art and life. The book is shaped around a series of portraits of the transgender activist and actress Gersande Spelsberg made by the artist and educator Adam Broomberg. Spelsberg sat for Broomberg and together they made 100 photographs, shot on 5”x4” negative and lit only using the sun and mirrors –– the same distinctive lighting technique employed in Helmar Lerski’s remarkable series Metamorphosis Through Light. Spelsberg’s story of transitioning reflects on and questions the many toxic pre-existing conditions that shape contemporary gender roles. A prismatic reflection on identity and encounter formed in the meeting of three uncompromising artists, Glitter in My Wounds confronts rigid conventions with an iconoclastic combination of portraits and poetics.