Robert Mapplethorpe - Photographs New York Thursday, April 4, 2019 | Phillips

Photographs

New York Auction 4 April 2019

  • Provenance

    Robert Miller Gallery, New York

  • Literature

    Schirmer/Mosel, Robert Mapplethorpe: The Black Book, frontispiece
    Kardon, Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment, p. 70
    Martineau and Salvesen, Robert Mapplethorpe: The Photographs, pl. 99
    Random House, Mapplethorpe, p. 164

  • Artist Biography

    Robert Mapplethorpe

    American • 1946 - 1989

    After studying drawing, painting and sculpture at the Pratt Institute in the 1960s, Robert Mapplethorpe began experimenting with photography while living in the notorious Chelsea Hotel with Patti Smith. Beginning with Polaroids, he soon moved on to a Hasselblad medium-format camera, which he used to explore aspects of life often only seen behind closed doors.

    By the 1980s Mapplethorpe's focus was predominantly in the studio, shooting portraits, flowers and nudes. His depiction of the human form in formal compositions reflects his love of classical sculpture and his groundbreaking marriage of those aesthetics with often challenging subject matter. Mapplethorpe's style is present regardless of subject matter — from erotic nudes to self-portraits and flowers — as he ceaselessly strove for what he called "perfection of form."

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93

Robert Mapplethorpe

Ajitto

1981
Gelatin silver print, printed 2009.
17 5/8 x 13 7/8 in. (44.8 x 35.2 cm)
Signed, dated by Michael Ward Stout, Executor, in ink and estate copyright credit reproduction limitation stamp on the reverse of the flush-mount. Number 12 from an edition of 15.

Estimate
$10,000 - 15,000 

Sold for $12,500

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Photographs

New York Auction 4 April 2019