The followg is an excerpt om "Did You Sleep Wh the Mols?" by Sam Staggs, former edor of the gay magaz Mandate, Honcho, and Playguy.
Contents:
REVIEW: LACMA’S ‘XYZ’ ON ROBERT MAPPLETHORPE: GAY ARTIST VS. STRAIGHT TRADN
Twenty-five years sce the photographer’s posthumo exhibn – which clud imag of gay S&M – beme a pot of bate, what have we learned? * was robert mapplethorpe gay *
Chartg his personal volvement New York’s gay scene, Robert Mapplethorpe’s photographs monstrated a pellg perspective on the unrground queer culture of the 1970s and 1980s. Patti Smh's boyiend, the gay New York artist who died of AIDS, the man who took a picture of fistg and lled art: However you know of cult photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, 's strange that we know so ltle about the man himself. Famed for shootg male nus, the sndal of the homoeroticism his pictur has overshadowed both the artist and work photos are strikg, even today still reasonably shockg, and unflchg.
He worked whout apology, vtg the homosexual wh granur, masculy, and enviable nobily. Gays weren't nng around llg themselv gay.
Rather, his var guis – ia man, gay sex fiend, femme fatale – reveal a mted exploratn of Catholic them faiar throughout art history: the basement and transcennce of the flh; transgrsn, punishment and nfsn; agony and ecstasy.
Review: LACMA's 'XYZ' on Robert Mapplethorpe: Gay artist vs. straight tradn * was robert mapplethorpe gay *
The lol media add a third rg to the circ, relayg not only events and public opn but also tg viewers on the fe pots of Oh obsceny law, the first amendment, the nature of art, homosexualy, the Aids crisis and sex acts most viewers never dreamed existed. Photograph: Rare books and archiv library at the Universy of CcnatiThe nflict me to a head on the day of the show’s openg, as lawmakers issued dictments agast the CAC and s director Dennis Barrie on charg of panrg obsceny for pictur of homoerotic acts and the illegal e of a mor nudy-oriented material. Photograph: Robert Mapplethorpe FoundatnCertaly attus towards homosexualy and Aids have changed, both of which clearly h nerv among certa members of the muny.
But if the homosexual ntent has lost some of s stg, the child nudy has not.
This stallment clus, along wh his pictur, works by six gay, lbian and queer artists — Lyle Ashton Harris, Rotimi Fani-Kayo, Glenn Ligon, Zanele Muholi, Cathere Opie and Pl Mpagi Sepuya — who have, different ways, been fluenced by him. The emergence of gay people to the mastream and, more to the pot, the ubiquy of ter pornography, have lifted Mapplethorpe’s kks out of the shadows.