Mary Willumsen
(1884–1961)
Initially, Willumsen’s photographs were of women in bathing suits or underclothes. However, as interest grew, Brix persuaded her to take nude pictures too, though Willumsen explained that she “never attempted to create pictures of an erotic or lewd character”. The ten or so women she used as models came from quite different backgrounds: everything from actresses to house maids and even some who were more associated with “loose living”. As her business expanded, she extended her sales to kiosks in Istegade and the Circus Garden in the centre of Copenhagen. Willumsen estimated that she was producing about 1,200 photographs a month, selling them at 25 øre each.
In 1919, the Copenhagen police began to investigate all the city’s kiosks to see if they were dealing in erotic photographs. As a result, in 1920 they arrested Mary Willumsen for overstepping the law. More than 1,000 of her postcards were seized from the Scala Kiosk in just one month and a total of 15,000 were confiscated as evidence. A further 10,000 were stopped on their way to Germany, showing the scale of the operation. The investigation became known as the “Aga Case” as it involved postcards sold through the mail order company “Aga Foto”. The courts finally determined that the postcards were in fact legal and returned most of them, dropping the charges.
Nevertheless, as a result of the police investigation, Willumsen immediately stopped producing postcards.
Photophilian 