Mapplethorpe

Robert Mapplethorpe
Tantric Garden
(components of an unrealized animation)
ca. 1969
paper collages with crayon on card
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Robert Mapplethorpe
Muscleman
1969
paper collage with crayon on paper
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

Robert Mapplethorpe
Untitled (Jamie)
ca. 1973
Polaroid
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

Robert Mapplethorpe
Dennis
1978
gelatin silver print
Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas

Kate Simon
Robert Mapplethorpe and Patti Smith
1978
gelatin silver print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Robert Mapplethorpe
Carolina Herrera
1979
gelatin silver print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Robert Mapplethorpe
Cindy Sherman
1983
gelatin silver print
Guggenheim Museum, New York

Robert Mapplethorpe
Keith Haring
1984
gelatin silver print
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Robert Mapplethorpe
Bill T. Jones
1985
gelatin silver print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Robert Mapplethorpe
Jasper Johns
1986
gelatin silver print
Moderna Museet, Stockholm

Robert Mapplethorpe
Louise Nevelson
1986
gelatin silver print
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Robert Mapplethorpe
Laurie Anderson
1987
gelatin silver print
National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC

Robert Mapplethorpe
Italian Devil
1988
platinum-palladium print
Guggenheim Museum, New York

Robert Mapplethorpe
Calla Lily
1988
gelatin silver print
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Robert Mapplethorpe
Calla Lily
1988
platinum-palladium print
Guggenheim Museum, New York

Robert Mapplethorpe
Sleeping Cupid
1989
gelatin silver print
Guggenheim Museum, New York

from Mornings in a New House

And still at dawn, the fire is lit

By whom a cold man hardly cares,

Reflection gliding up the legs of chairs,

Flue choking with the shock of it.

Next a frozen window thaws

In gradual slow stains of field,

Snow fence and birches more or less revealed.

This done, the brightness sheathes its claws.

The worst is over. Now between

His person and that tamed uprush

(Which to recall alone can make him flush)

Habit arranges the fire screen.*

*Days later. All framework & embroidery rather than any slower looking into things. Fire screen – screen of fire. The Valkyrie's baffle, pulsing a trance pitch, godgiven, elemental. Flames marking that cast-iron plaque – "contrecoeur" in French – which backs the hearth with charred Loves & Graces. Some such meaning might have caught, only I didn't wait, I settled for the obvious – by lamplight as it were. Oh well. Our white heats lead us on no less than words do. Both have been devices in their day. 

– James Merrill (1969)