“A little while ago, not much more than a few days ago, I was a child who went about in a world of colors, of hard and tangible forms. Everything was mysterious and something was hidden, guessing what it was was a game for me. If you knew how terrible it is to know suddenly, as if a bolt of lightning elucidated the earth. Now I live in a painful planet, transparent as ice; but it is as if I had learned everything at once in seconds.”

All photographs are from around 1910 to 1915 and exemplify an early color photography process patented by the Lumière brothers.

Photography by Abbey Meaker ©

“Molinier began to take photographs at the age of 18. When Molinier’s sister died in 1918, he is alleged to have had sex with her corpse while left alone to photograph it. ‘Even dead, she was beautiful. I shot sperm on her stomach and legs, and onto the First Communion dress she was wearing. She took with her into death the best of me.’”

Photography by Oliver Maxwell Kupper

From the top: 1. Murder 2. Murder 3. Suicide (mid-jump)

1922