Monday entry (for 9/21/09): Artist of interest: Robert Mapplethorpe

Robert Mapplethorpe was born on November 4, 1946 in Queens, New York and died on March 9, 1989 at the tender age of 42 from complications from AIDS. Mapplethorpe attempted a degree in graphic arts at the Pratt Institute of Art in Brooklyn, New York before dropping out in 1969. Soon thereafter he picked up a Polaroid camera and began shooting his first batch of photographs using his friends and acquaintances as models. Later in the mid-70s he bought a Hasselblad and started including artists, composers and socialites in his photos. It was in the 80s that he refined his technique and began shooting what he is now most known for, which is his statuesque portraits of male and female nudes, formal portraits of artists and celebrities and flower still lives.

What Mapplethorpe is most remembered for is the controversy that arose in 1989 when the Corcoran Museum of Art in Washinton D.C. agreed to show a traveling solo exhibit of Mapplethorpe's work without expressing what type of subject matter they would or would not accept. The body of work that was sent to the Corcoran was created before Mapplethorpe's death and depicted explicit sexual acts. Once the photos arrived at the Corcoran, the hierarchy of the museum and several members of Congress were horrified by the images and decided not to go through with the show. Once pop artist Lowell Blair Nesbitt heard that the museum wasn't going to display the photos, he issued them an ultimatum to either display Mapplethorpe's work or he wouldn't bequeath the $1.5 million dollars he promised to leave them once he died. The Corcoran still refused and the show was later picked up by the Washington Project for the Arts and drew in large crowds due to the controversy. Newsbitt ended up bequeathing his money to the Phillips Collection instead.

The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation official website. A foundation which Mapplethorpe himself helped set up before he died.

An interview with Robert Mapplethorpe's biographer and lover, Jack Fritscher.