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Saturday, Mar 20, 2010
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Amateur Mapplethorpe |
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| Amateur Mapplethorpe | ||
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by Paul Varnell -
SGN Contributing Writer Robert Mapplethorpe (1946-1989) was not always the finished photographer most people know from his elegant, highly stylized photographs of flowers, nudes, and celebrities from the 1980s. Polaroids: Mapplethorpe, a new book of nearly 200 snapshots culled from more than 1500 Mapplethorpe took during the early 1970s, gives us a fascinating window into his early fumbling efforts and his growing concern with lighting, contrast, and sense of formal design. Mapplethorpe's father was an amateur photographer, but Mapplethorpe himself showed little interest in photography until a friend loaned him her Polaroid camera in 1970. At that point he seems to have become hooked and began taking pictures of flowers, friends, himself, nudes - and, increasingly, men in leather and S/M situations. What is interesting here is how much of his later subject matter is anticipated in his early snapshots. Mapplethorpe himself said that his artistic vision was fully formed when he started taking photographs. Among the most numerous "portrait" snapshots are those of singer Patti Smith who lived with Mapplethorpe for several years. He seems to have followed her around almost obsessively taking pictures of her at any moment. There are also several of his early lovers, model David Croland and wealthy former curator Sam Wagstaff. These, however, are exceeded in number by photos of himself, some playful, some serious, several nude, some in leather garb. There is even one of him masturbating. There are also several photos taken in a mirror of Mapplethorpe photographing a dancer - the so called "artist and model" genre. As his biographer Patricia Morrisroe comments, "Mapplethorpe, like Narcissus, was infatuated with his own reflection, and he still maintained a juvenile curiosity about his body." Among the rest are snapshots of casual friends and overnight tricks from the bars, several of whom seem quite stoned or spaced out. Curiously, given Mapplethorpe's later obsession with well-hung black men as tricks and models - "black fever," he called it - only two of the photographs are of a young black man. Many of the snapshots are artless, far from the later formally posed shots he is known for. He seems to have thought all you needed to do was put the subject at the center and snap the shutter. Gradually, he began experimenting with asymmetric composition or balancing elements on one side with something on the other. His early flower pictures are poor. He seemed satisfied to throw a bunch of flowers together and take a picture. It was only later that he learned to focus on a single blossom and light it for high contrast. He does better with still-lifes, grasping the idea that a simple subject and high contrast are good starting points. An early shot of a white pitcher against a darker background is a good example, as is one of a white telephone, or a dark wine bottle against a white background. Others contrast a dark object with a lighter one. A few still-lifes are erotically symbolic: two pairs of boots, one pair between the other, facing opposite directions; a thumb inserted into a closed fist, or a banana with a bunch of keys hanging from it. One still-life of a vacuum cleaner and a pile of white dust seems to allude to snorting cocaine. The majority of the snapshots offered here, however, focus on male nudes, leather and S/M, not quite so extreme as some of his later pictures but suggestive of his growing interest. Many show men in various leather/fetish clothes. One man wears a mask and a genital pouch with shoulder straps that looks like a picture from a leatherwear catalogue. More outré shots show penises tied up in various ways or men bound with ropes. A few show men with weights attached to their nipples or testicles. In most cases the emphasis seems to have been on documenting the image rather than any attempt to render it artistically. Perhaps, though, the contrast of black leather on white males appealed to his intuitive aesthetic and sparked his growing concern with lighting and contrast. Biographer Morrisroe comment that Mapplethorpe "wanted to bring pornography into the realm of art." And Mapplethorpe has been quoted as saying, "I don't think there's that much difference between a photograph of a fist up someone's ass and a photograph of carnations in a bowl." But on the basis of photos offered here, that aestheticizing concern developed only gradually. Unfortunately, the Mapplethorpe Foundation has sharply limited which snapshots may be used with published reviews, permitting the use of few of the leather and none of the S/M-oriented shots. For the rest it remains only to notice that a few snapshots seem to anticipate his later photos or allude to other art. One of a leatherman leaning over a table anticipates his photo of Marc Stevens ("Mr. 10 1/2") leaning protectively over his large penis placed on a table. A "butt shot" with a spigot aimed at the model's rectum anticipates Mapplethorpe's later self-portrait with a bullwhip inserted into his rectum. A few photos of a nude man posing in a wall niche recalls classical statues, while a photo of just the head of a long-haired, blond man seems in imitation not of Caravaggio's "David with the Head of Goliath," as the Introduction suggests, but of Paul Cadmus's painting on the same theme. In sum, the book is interesting as much for what is not yet here as for what is. In any case, Mapplethorpe's basic themes - his "artistic vision" - does seem already formed. He just learned to express it better. |
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