In 1907 Franz von Bayros started using the ‘French’ pseudonym Choisy le Conin for his erotic works, partly to protect his true identity and partly to help sales in the lucrative Paris art-book market. Choisy’s first album of prints was printed privately ‘for Henrich Conrad and his friends’, and contained fifteen plates with the intriguing Germano-French title Die Grenouillère, grenouillère meaning a one-piece sleeping suit (today a onesie) with the same implication as the English-language ‘birthday suit’.

Lesbianism is the main theme here, with strap-ons and group sex the order of the day. Von Bayros’s imagination is matched by his artistic skill to create scenes which were almost guaranteed to attract the attention of official censorship, even in relatively liberal Munich.

The portfolio was produced in a limited numbered edition of 525 copies, 25 of which were signed by Bayros as ‘Choisy le Conin’.