Mapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures (2016) - full transcript

Robert Mapplethorpe,

a known homosexual
who died of AIDS

and who spent
the last years of his life
promoting homosexuality.

Now, if any senator doesn't
know what I'm talking about

in terms of the art
that I have protested,

look at the pictures!

Now, any senator who thinks

that I'm attacking
aesthetic art--

I don't know whether
the television cameras
can see it or not,

I'm gonna be fast enough
with it that they can't.

But I want senators
to come over here,
if they have any doubt,



and look at the pictures.

In Cincinnati, police closed
down the Mapplethorpe exhibit.

We are sending
the Mapplethorpe
exhibit to trial.

Come over here.
Look at the pictures.

One of two artists whose
works led to a dispute...

Look at the pictures.
Look at the pictures.

Look at the pictures.

Who is Mapplethorpe?

The art gallery
and its director

are charged with obscenity
for exhibiting photographs by
the late Robert Mapplethorpe.

Look at the pictures.

Mapplethorpe's work
is highly controversial.

Can I show it to you?
I don't want to look at it.

I don't even acknowledge
that it's art.



Keep your hands off!

I don't even acknowledge

that the fellow who did it
was an artist.

I think he was a jerk...

...jerk, jerk.

This is one of five vaults

in which Mapplethorpe's
archive resides.

Audiovisual material is
in here

along with more ephemeral
paperwork from his studio
and personal correspondence.

Photographs are
in a cooler environment,

and Polaroids are in
an even colder environment.

One of our big challenges
is to really make a case

for why we're doing
two concurrent exhibitions...

Right.
...about one artist.

This is two sides
of one coin.

Yeah.

There is a duality that runs
through Mapplethorpe's
work and life

and we hope to be able
to divide the material

in a way that would
highlight that duality.

This is a box
of self-portraits.
Right.

Oh.
Oh.

Yeah, biker jacket
from the back.

Yeah.

I really like
this white piping

and how it leads up
to this other shape.
Yeah.

That's one
of the great ones.

When you say Mapplethorpe,
people immediately think

of the controversies that
happened during the '90s.

"Guerrilla Rebel."

Yeah.

Mapplethorpe was
being demonized

by conservative politicians,

so one of our goals was
to humanize Mapplethorpe,

to bring him back into
people's consciousness
as a human being.

It's quite convincing.

Ah.
Oh.

Mapplethorpe and bullwhip.

I remember it being
a slightly higher contrast.

It's a different paper.
Right.

This is a lot warmer
and softer.

Mm-hmm.

The way his hand is,

it's so great,
it almost looks like
he's releasing a shadow.

Yes. Because that cord
comes just to the edge
of the frame.

The cord kind of connects
the viewer with Mapplethorpe.

Yeah.

Because it's coming
out of the picture.

As well as the eye contact.

Right.
Obviously,

it's very defiant.

He's not hiding his face.
He's not hiding his identity.

He's not hiding
what he's doing.

Robert was just...
my younger brother.

I'm the oldest.

That's myself,
my brother Richard,

Robert, Edward,
Sue, and James.

That's the six of us.

When we were young,
we did a lot of coloring.

Robert always
had weird things.

He'd have a green face,

or... just not the norm.

Purple hair, or something.

And I'd say,
"Why are you doing that for?

"That's not the way
it's supposed to be."

As far as, like, photographs,

he never took photographs.

My dad took
a lot of photographs.

Robert, he had no interest
in that at all.

My wife and I and the children
moved here in 1949.

I was always interested
in photography,

but none of my kids were
until Eddie.

I had all the equipment
downstairs, a darkroom,

enlarger and printer and dryer
and everything else.

This is the block
we lived on.

See, all the houses
were the same?

This is during the snow.

This is Robert here
with two of his friends.

You know, we had to be home
a certain time for dinner,

and you had to sit
at the table until
you finished your dinner.

Robert was this regular kid.

One thing was, his endurance
on a pogo stick.

He was having competitions
with people.

He would go all the way around
the block on a pogo stick.

Robert was the pogo stick
champ of 259th Street,
of the neighborhood.

He just could go on forever,
and he was so proud of that.

You know, there's something
about black and white pictures
that are so much better

because they last.

I took this of Robert
in front of our house, right?

The rest of them,
all these, he took of me,

and, I believe, is probably
the first pictures he took.

"Sense and Nonsense!"

There was this television
program in the early '50s.

Someone would give them
something to taste with
their blindfolds on

and you would have
to guess what it is.

That's how we play the game,
identifying items by means
of our five senses.

Well, we Mapplethorpe kids
made our own

"Sense and Nonsense" game.

Robert, little devil
that he was,

went to one of the many
ashtrays around the house,

which were always full,

and put ashes
in my brother's mouth,

and they were fuming.

That's the kind of stuff
he did, that kind of
needling stuff.

So he was
a devilish guy.

We never missed
Mass on Sunday.

We always went to church.

And I still do.

I first met
Robert Mapplethorpe

when I was assigned to
Our Lady of the Snows Parish
in Floral Park.

They were active
in the parish, you know,

so I got to know
the whole family.

So Robert just kind of
took to me,

and I, you know, took to him.

And... he used to paint
me pictures.

He drew me a couple of
paintings of the Blessed
Mother, the Virgin Mary,

and I thought to myself,
"He's been too influenced
by Picasso."

You know?

But anyway,
I have to say that, first,

he was the only person I knew

who could sit on a couch
and chew his toenails.

The other thing was,
you'd look at Robert

and I think the first thing
you'd notice is his eyes.

They were huge,

and as if he was
always looking,

always penetrating, always...

you know,
trying to get through.

I come from this, you know,
suburban America.

It was a very
safe environment,

and it was a good place
to come from

in that it was a good
place to leave.

He never quite
really fit in

with all these
other teenage boys, you know?

There was something
very fragile about Robert.

Robert was mom's favorite.
I don't know why though.

I can't put my finger
on specific things,

but I always say,
"Oh, Robert was her favorite."

Somehow that just
wasn't enough for me.

Robert was smart.
Everything came easy to him.

I worked like a dog
for my marks,

but he graduated at 16.

As soon as I could,
I started art school training,

and I moved to Brooklyn.

My dad was
basically against it.

My father thought,
you can do it as a hobby,

but what are you ever
gonna do with art?

Did you know that photography

and homosexuality share
something in common?

Growing respect for
photography in the art world

occurred simultaneously

with the growing visibility
of the gay rights movement.

Each suffered a gauntlet
of prejudice during
their coming of age.

Just as Mapplethorpe
was starting out,

to be openly gay was still
very much a cultural taboo.

And photography was
considered not much more
than a utilitarian medium,

an applied art,
a bastard of the arts.

He was very young
when he started Pratt.

He just looked like
a little boy and people
made fun of him.

At that time his name
was Bob Mapplethorpe,

and to further diminish him,

they called him "Maypo,"

because that was a children's
cereal back in those days.

♪ I want my Maypo,
I want my Maypo ♪

He was not macho.

It makes you strong.

He told me he would take his
father's negatives to class

and present them
as his own work.

He was a fuckup.

So I was interested in
his experience at Pratt

and how he found himself
as an artist there.

Is that a self-portrait?

Yes. This one's
actually ink,

so I'm imagining he, like,
rolled an oil-based ink
onto his face.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Yeah.

Which is kind of
hard to comprehend.

The psychedelia of it too.

He was really into acid
at the time.

We both had
a similar background.

Right off the bat,
I think we kind of hit it off.

He started taking drugs
and smoked marijuana. LSD.

We both were living on

candy bars and cigarettes,
basically,

and he was getting really
skinny and we were both
really pale-looking...

But we smoked, and so
he put LSD in the cigarette.

I completely lost my memory.

And so... I, uh...

I don't know,
I'm losing track now.

I'm kind of like, having a...

I'm going back there
too much, I guess.

When I was in art school,
I'd stay up all night, stoned,

trying to think
what hasn't been done,

and I was obsessed with
trying to come up with
a new approach to art

and to be unique somehow.

Bob and I realized
you have to get
a little name recognition

and sometimes the weird thing
works-- can work well for you.

So, somewhere along the way
there, he had purchased
this little monkey

and he named it Scratch,

and I did some really
nice drawings of Scratch.

The monkey had
some bad habits.

The monkey masturbated a lot,

and the monkey
threw crap at you sometimes.

He would walk around with
the monkey on his shoulder

and he was
wearing a black cape.

Robert and I graduated Pratt
in '67,

the Summer of Love
and blah, blah, blah.

And here is Robert
standing all by himself

in a corner, hanging,
you know, hiding his face.

He's extremely mysterious.

And that's who he was.

McCue:
The final project
for both of us

was to make a musical
instrument out of a bone.

Then I remember,
I got a call from Bob

and he was all kind of
weepy and he said,

"I don't know what to do.
Scratch has died."

It was maybe
two o'clock in the morning.

He came in
and he was really shook.

He said,
"I boiled Scratch's head,

"and I've got my bone,

"but, you know,
it was terrible.

"It smelled terrible.
I hated doing it,
I had to cut his head off."

So he aced the project.

Yeah.

There was a lot of negativity,

even at Pratt,
toward what I did.

You know, people would say,

"That isn't art, that isn't
the way you make art,"

and I just did it
the way I wanted to do it.

Robert set himself
apart from his classmates.

It's a beast and this
is his backside.

It's a pose
that he uses himself

later on in self-portraits.
Hmm.

If you compare it
to "Bullwhip,"
that backward pose,

he already has it in his mind.

The last time I saw Bob,
he had no clothes on.

He was afraid. He had all
the furniture stacked up
against the door,

and he was really beside
himself and he said,

"I'm afraid. I'm afraid.
Someone's coming.
Someone's coming.

Could you give me $20?"

I met Robert accidentally

and he was just a boy.
I mean, we were both 20.

He was... He was
a kid going to Pratt,

and we fell in love
and he was my boyfriend.

It was
the first time I had ever
been in love with anybody,

so the fact that it was--
it was somebody as unique
as Patti,

I mean, she was-- she was
a magical kind of person.

So like, you know,
and she was--

she was supportive of
what I was doing, or my magic,

and I was supportive
of her magic.

Neither one of us
were ever jealous,

so it was like,
you know, it was like
a storybook relationship.

He helped me to build
confidence in my work

and to think
of myself as artist,

to have a concept
of oneself as an artist.

That was always
really important to Robert,

not as an apprentice,
not as a student,

but as an artist.

I loved photographing
my friends,

and Robert called me and said,
"Can you do some naked
pictures of Patti and me?

I want to make
a little film called
'Garden of Earthly Delights.'"

So then we set up lights
on the back of a chair,

and I just took the pictures
that he asked for.

Robert and Patti were
so beautiful in such
an interesting way

and in an unconventional way,
I think.

He exuded this kind of
androgynous sexuality,

and so did Patti.

Patti was drawing
all the time,

and Robert was drawing all
the time and making things.

You know, it was messy.

There was stuff
hanging around,
tacked up on the walls.

It looked like a scene
from a Godard movie.

We sat for hours and hours,
night after night, drawing

and, you know, drawing from
each other as well as drawing.

I'm a thief and I dig it.

A good thief never hesitates.

A good thief steals clean.

And I'm stealing now.
And I'm stealing now.

And I'm stealing now.

The Chelsea has been home

for more than a century
to a colony of artists

who have also celebrated it
in books,

poems, plays,
dance, and painting.

I kept on saying to Patti...

I loved them.
We were like a family.

He kept telling me
I was like a sister.

Patti was working like crazy
to let us live.

I mean, she was very generous,

and she wasn't jealous of me
at all, which is wonderful.

She trusted me
with Robert, totally.

I never was in love with him

or had any sexual
feelings for him,

but we were very close.

We would sit
in my totally white,
empty room at the Chelsea,

which supposedly had
had Oscar Wilde stay in it,

and had had Jackson Pollock
stay in it.

And I had Warhol's clouds
floating, the helium clouds.

That's all I had in the room,

and a mattress.

We lived on the floor
and it was clean enough
to eat off of them.

That's exactly what we did.

It was a 25-hour
art show all the time,

or movie set or whatever
you would wanna call the life.

It was just
the life being recorded.

In a stark,
sun-drenched studio,

lives filmmaker
Sandra Daley.

I called him up, I said,

"Could you bring over
some of the things

"and put them up on the walls?

Because there's nothing here,
you know, it's all white."

And he came over
with the stuff,

and I looked, I thought,
"God, leather pants
with a cock sticking out."

I thought, "Why not?"
It looked fabulous.

I was working
with articles of clothing.

They were kind of
like fetish sculpture.

You know, if I had a jacket
that I wore all the time,
I'd put it in a piece

and, you know.
So it was like assemblage.

What's made you
live in the Chelsea
for the past seven years?

Um, my friends,
I guess, live here,

and my teachers.

It's my home.

Robert didn't say much.

He didn't talk at all,
did he, in that clip?

Robert could sit in silence

a lot more comfortably
than I could.

I'm Edward Mapplethorpe.

Robert Mapplethorpe's brother.

I was three years of age
when he left the house.

I remember just waiting
anxiously on my stoop

and knowing Robert
and Patti were coming.

And then I'd be like,
"Wow." Like, "Wow,
look at these guys."

I mean, they didn't
look like anybody else.

They didn't talk
like anybody else.

I would say, creature.
They were like creatures.

Just the way he dressed,
the way he carried himself.

The way his hair was,
the way, uh...

It was just...

It encompassed him.

The art,
the artist encompassed him.

There was no separation.

Wow.

I see them as exquisite.

Most porn looks amateurish

and lower class.

Just make it look like,

I think I said
a Louis Quinze chair,

so that it just
takes your breath away.

It doesn't matter
what the subject matter is.

It's like a love story...
to porn, maybe.

There was a feeling
I could get

through looking
at pornographic imagery,

and I thought if I could
somehow retain that feeling,
you know,

it was like,
maybe it was the forbidden
because I was young, you know.

That if I could get
that across and make
an art statement,

make it do it in a way
that just kind of, like,

reached a certain
kind of perfection

that I would be doing
something that was
uniquely my own.

Oh, and that one
even includes a camera.

Right.
And that--
He highlighted it.

And this was before he was
even making photographs.
I think.

But this is when
he started thinking,
"It may be cheaper for me..."

Yeah. Yeah.
...to take photographs
than buy all this porn.

Same great film...

I wanted raw material
that originated with myself.

I felt that I was stealing
them from other people,

and so that's how
I started with the Polaroids.

You know, it was not because
I wanted to be a photographer.

We had a Polaroid camera

and Polaroid film
was really expensive,

so my focus
was always that Robert
got what he needed first.

And we had
so little money for film.

We concentrated on
getting him the film.

It was all there
from the start.

And when I first started
taking Polaroids,

I was working with photographs
that dealt with sexuality,

portraits, flowers,
and still lives

because I used the still lives
to experiment with lighting.

These are the first times
that Robert took emulsion.

He washed it off
of the Polaroid till it
floated above the base

and stretched them out.

That's me, ugly as ever.

Here's Patti.

And that's David Croland.

I'm really not
a model anymore.

I'm just a...
you know, an object.

If you want an explanation
of why I'm wearing this robe,

it's for Robert,
and Robert liked robes,

and he liked black silk.

And I thought twice
about it, and then I thought,

"You're not gonna
think three times."

Patti is the first girl
he photographed for Polaroid

and I was the first boy.

I met Robert in 1970
on Memorial Day,

on a steamy hot day.

As soon as he got his camera,

the film was loaded
and my clothes were off.

Starting with a robe

and then the robe was, like,
here, et cetera, et cetera.

He photographed me
a lot in that.

And in those days,
I just thought, "Who cares?
Polaroid film?"

I was used
to being photographed
by the big format,

you know, by...
Should we drop some names?

Someone said,
"Stop dropping names."

I said, "I can't help it if
everyone I know is fantastic."

So I thought
these Polaroids were like,
"What the hell are these?"

I saw very quickly that
he wasn't just stacking up
a bunch of Polaroids.

He was making
stuff out of them.

He was incorporating them
into a new type of art,

which no one was doing.

No one.

Uh-uh.

And then someone called Patti
to say they are boyfriends.

So that was...
We were busted.

Patti knew that
I was helping Robert,

so there was no animosity,
not at all.

At least, I don't think so.

When you're young, you don't
have much of a conscience.

I mean, when you're young,
I don't even know
if you think.

I don't even think it's a good
idea to think, to this day.

It's just better to do stuff.

I had this
small amount of money.

I could make a movie.

I said, "Robert, you can pick
out anything you want to do."

I just thought it
would be interesting to have

a ring through your tit

because I maybe seen it
in a movie or something,

but it wasn't something
anybody had at that moment.

And all of a sudden,
there was a whole situation
where I was...

to get my nipple pierced.

I had done a number of films
for Andy Warhol,

so I was used--

and as a model
I was used to having
the camera trained on me.

Yes.

But I had no idea
where that film was going.

Where that film went was
to the Museum of Modern Art,

and it showed there
at a big screening.

MoMA was very crowded,

and I was writing film reviews
then for the "Village Voice,"

and I remember Robert was
standing against the wall

and he had this sort of
angelic kind of hair,

and I guess I had a crush
on him and whatever.

Right way, in my mind,
I saw him as an angel
and a devil.

Then Patti has
this brilliant monologue

that she did
as the soundtrack.

I read this book,
Robert had this book in his--

he had this book in his drawer
called "Leather Boys,"

and, like, I picked it up
the other night
because he went out.

Once he got his
leather pants, he would be
down on Christopher Street.

Like, it was like
my boyfriend or nothing.

I guess the reason--
the only reason
I don't like it

is because, like,
they got secrets.

"In sharp counterpoint
to the delicacy of the visuals

"is the harsh and hilarious
soundtrack by Patti Smith,

"poet, Robert's
ex-girlfriend..."

"...who, it seems, dislikes
homosexuals because,

"A, she feels left out,

and B, they use
their assholes."

He called me after the review
came out and said that
he really liked it

and could we, like,
meet for a cup of coffee
or something.

Robert and I would,
you know, meet up, like,
at 4:00 in the afternoon,

go into some
deserted restaurant and sit--

you know, just order coffee,

and he only had
a Polaroid then.

He didn't even have a camera.

But he was already,
you know, planning on
his first exhibition,

and who he was going to invite
and who he hoped would come.

This is Robert Mapplethorpe's
announcement

for his first solo exhibition.

The envelope is embossed
by Tiffany and Company.

It was a show of Polaroids.

He encased his announcement
in the "don't touch here"
safety cover

from the Polaroid film pack.

Terpak:
Mapplethorpe says
in several interviews,

"An exhibition doesn't begin
when you go to the opening.

It begins when
you get the invitation."

It's a small dot sticker...

that's really not opaque.

But what do you
want the viewer to feel

when they open
that invitation?

I want them to remember it,
that's all.

You're thinking of, like,

standing out
from this huge mass--

Why can't it be in terms
of one's whole lifestyle?

You know what I'm saying?

The whole point
of being an artist
or making a statement

is to learn about yourself.

I think that's
the most important part.

The photographs, I think,
are less important

than the life
that one is leading.

I would just run around
and give people their food.

And it really was
a comprehensive scene
of downtown artists.

Not a closed world,
but it was, you know, almost
like a clubhouse in a way.

I probably saw Robert
almost every night of my life.

You know, most people
that I knew lived
in such horrible places

that you really only knew
where they lived
if you had sex with them.

Lots of times in Max's,
he would come and sit with me,
you know.

It was probably the time
I enjoyed Robert the most

because he was
an incredibly amusing gossip.

He was extremely good-looking
in a very particular way,
you know.

No one that saw Robert

did not have a crush
on him immediately.

No one. Everyone.
Dogs liked him.

He looked kind of like,
you know, a kind of
ruined Cupid.

And he was very reliant
on his charm, you know.

I mean, in other words,
he made great use of it,

by which I mean,
productive to Robert.

Robert was not a hustler.
Robert didn't have to hustle.

People hustled Robert...

mainly out of his pants
if they could.

Me too, by the way.

Robert didn't think anything
was wrong with his ambition.

He didn't think of it
as selling out.

He didn't think--
He just, you know, pursued it
the way that people now do.

Was Robert ambitious?

There is no word for it.

For either of them.

That is an understatement.

For both of them.

Yeah.

Unbelievably.

I went away for a summer,

and when I got back,
Robert was suddenly into S&M.

One day, I showed up
at his place

and he was wearing
leather pants

and it looked like a radio
attached to his crotch.

I said,
"What the hell is that?"

He said, "Oh, it's a codpiece.
Isn't it great?"

I said, "This is like
the beginning of the end if
you keep dressing like this."

He started to trick me out
in leather jackets
and handcuffs.

He started to get
not me, at all,

and more him,

and he wanted me to go--
always to go further.

And I thought,
"That's not gonna happen.
I'm a model."

Sam Wagstaff, I only knew that
he was eccentric, handsome,

and then when
he took me to this loft
later that day, rich.

But right before we went
to his loft on Bond Street,

he spied a little,
tiny picture of Robert

taken in a photo booth
with a little sailor cap on.

It looked like
a Jean Genet drawing.

And he said, "Who is this?"

I said, "That's my
soon-to-be ex-boyfriend."

So I called Robert up
and I said, "Listen.

"Your ship's come in,
it's in my harbor.

"You're gonna
jump on this boat.

You're gonna love him,
he's gonna love you,
I can tell."

They had a date that week,

and they fell in love
very quickly.

Sam was his protector,
in every way.

You know, in the way that
girls are protected by men.

It was a beautiful match.

Beautiful. Really beautiful.

I knew other people who had
older guys who supported them
and stuff like that,

but Sam devoted himself.

The career Robert had,

I don't believe
would've existed without Sam.

I met him when he moved
next to us on Bond Street,

so he was literally
the boy next door,

and we just instantly
became friends.

It's this little Cobblestone
Street in New York.

Robert lived
at 24 Bond Street,

and Brice and Helen Marden
lived at 26 Bond Street,

and I lived at 42 Bond Street.

And the '70s in New York was
very different than now.

New York was bankrupt,

things were pretty
corrupt and violent.

There was a lot of crime,

and, you know, Bond and Bowery
was in the middle of,

you know, people
sleeping in the doorways

and lying on the streets,

but it was the art world.

When we first moved here,
I was hysterical.

I said, "We've just spent
40,000 bucks on this dump.

"And look at this area.
Look at this."

I mean, it's, like, miles
before you can get

to a restaurant,
a grocery store,

you know, a light at night,
the place is dark.

You had this beautiful,
free-flowing stream,

then there'd be all
the soapsuds and garbage.

Junkies.
You see, that's the way
Bond Street was.

And now, of course,
the last time I tracked it,

the penthouse
in that building, I think,
sold for 19 million.

I never thought we'd have
any money. Did you?

No, it wasn't--
it wasn't the intention.

I mean, it wasn't
as though it was just
a band of innocents, you know.

You came to New York
because you felt you had
to be in New York,

you know, or else you would
have just gone to some place
that was nice to live.

He loved coming over

and taking photographs
of my bats.

You know, he wasn't
Robert Mapplethorpe
in the beginning.

You know, there was
no thought that this was
Robert Mapplethorpe, right?

Right, Brice?
Right, yeah.

Nothing, you know. We were
just all doing our work
and chatting about it.

We'd go to these funny
little used book stores

and they'd have, like,
cardboard boxes filled
with old postcards

and filled with
old photo prints,

and Robert would go through
them and he'd find, you know,

a Weston or a Steichen
or something.

And it was like no one knew
what it was, and it was like
$5 or $10,

and he would do that much more
once he got together with Sam.

See, what
happened is I started
collecting photography,

so I studied it through
holding these pictures
in my hand,

which is probably the best way
to study photography.

Robert and I liked to lie
on his bed and look at all
the photographs Sam bought,

and then he would tell me
how much they were worth
and we would laugh.

Never having really looked
at photographs as art,

it really took Robert
to bring me to photography.

What are you up to?

I've been working.

You should see
some of Robert's works.

I'll be getting down
after the sale.

There was something
about the quality

of even the Polaroids,
which startled me.

Something very knife-sharp
about his work.

I think this is the most
intimate thing we have
in the archive

between Sam and Robert.
Mm-hmm.

Robert doesn't write,

so in a way, this linen album
is his love letter to Sam.

You can see the dialogue
that's going on between them

about photography, and love
and all that sexuality.

Yeah.

I used to be
slightly embarrassed

by certain photographs
that Robert took.

He helped me get over that.

Robert, has always liked
to play on the edge
of pornography.

I always was
fascinated with the idea

of taking a loaded
subject like sexuality

and somehow bringing it
to a level that it hadn't
been to before.

He's absolutely
wedded to truth

and opens it up
in front of his camera
in an almost surgical way.

And I remember
somebody saying,

"You know, you really
shouldn't do that because it's
gonna fuck up your career."

And I said I thought
it was stupid for him
to even think that way.

I was convinced that
what I was doing was
the right thing to be doing.

I met Robert in the early '70s
on Fire Island,

where his friend, Wagstaff,
was renting a beautiful house

and they invited me to stay.

The '70s was a sexual time,

and Fire Island,
we went for sex,

for that
beautiful availability
of sexual encounters.

I mean, the drugs
were floating around.

It was heaven.

Whenever we went out,
I was recognized, right?

And people stopped me
and Robert liked that,

and he was craving
for fame and he enjoyed
to be seen with me,

but he was sort of
feeling he should be the one
who should be recognized.

And so I agreed,
as a friend, to pose for him.

Then when
the weekend was over,

Robert went back to New York
City to work on his career.

For me, the ambition
was to get laid.

Robert's ambition was
to be a great photographer
and that's why he is,

because in order
to be a Mapplethorpe,
you had to work hard.

He walked into
my office at "Drummer,"

a major gay magazine
where I was the editor,

wearing leather chaps
and a leather jacket,

carrying a black
leather portfolio,

and said, "Hello,
I'm Robert Mapplethorpe,

the pornographic
photographer."

Well, everybody that came
to my desk

was a pornographic
photographer.

The problem in the '70s
was everybody was having sex.

Photographers
weren't shooting,

painters weren't painting,
writers weren't writing,

but Robert was functioning.

And we ended up in bed,
then we became

bicoastal lovers
for the next three years.

He knew that he needed
to be written about,

which is one of the reasons
he came to "Drummer."

I was just one of many
writers that he approached.

I mean, nearly all of his
friends were writers.

He wanted to be a legend.

He told me he wanted to be
a story told in beds at night
around the world.

He had that kind of drive,

and in a way, that's part
of what makes geniuses,

this self-centeredness
and this ability
to use people.

So I was someone
who could help Robert.

I had that power of being
editor of "Interview,"

but I don't think
we used him that much

because I was aware
that Andy didn't like him.

He always just said,
"Oh, he's so dirty-looking,"

and, you know,
"He's so creepy,"

and Andy didn't like
anybody who took Polaroids.

He thought he sort of was
the only person who should
be taking Polaroids.

But once Andy realized that
Robert was with Sam Wagstaff,
he started to like him.

So it was okay for me to then
use him for "Interview,"

and we sent him to Mustique.

We met Robert, my husband
and I, on our way to Mustique,

in a private little plane.

I haven't heard of him at all,

but I was fascinated
by his mind,

and on top of that,
he was so good-looking.

He said, at one point,
"I want to photograph you."

And I said, "No way."

And he said, "You know what?

"You might regret it later,

"because I'm going
to be a fantastic
and great photographer,

and you're not going to have
a photograph taken by me."

He was a big hit
with the aristocracy,

and he loved Mustique
and then Mustique loved him.

He was living this double
kind of life

where he would be uptown
at a fancy dinner...
Mm-hmm.

...and then he would go
to the Mine Shaft.

It looks well-worn.

Can you imagine it?
It's not just a souvenir.
Back pocket.

Well, that was one of
the key places he went to find
his models, The Mine Shaft.

What went on in the Mine Shaft
for all those years

was two floors of
the most outrageous sex

had this side of Ancient Rome.

All kinds of S&M sex,

scatological sex, fetish sex,

from the sling, to the stocks,
to the whipping post.

People talked of a famous
bathtub, I mean, there was
always somebody in it,

and a ring of men around it,
one, two, three layers deep,

everybody jerking off,
touching each other, moving.

It's just like a scrum
around that bathtub.

And then the ones in the first
line would piss all over
whoever was in the bathtub.

The work dealing
with sexuality

is very directly related
to my own experiences.

It was an area that
hadn't been explored
in contemporary art,

and so it was an area
that interested me in terms
of making my statement.

I was in the perfect situation
in that most of the people
in those photographs

were friends of mine,
and they trusted me.

And I felt like
it was an obligation
to record those things.

Robert and I first met...
at The Mine Shaft.

He comes over and I'm like,
"Oh, here it goes.

"We're gonna have an orgy

or go down in the basement."

He was very good-looking,

you know, all in black
leather. It was like--
it was hot.

He said,
"Let's get out of here,"

and we went home, did a bit
of coke, had some sex.

Very, very, vanilla sex.

He looked bored
out of his mind.

And we were up
in to two hours.

Just as I was nodding off,
get up to do the first shoot.

We did it like 6:30,
7:00 in the morning.

He said he liked the light
coming in the window.

It becomes
a documentary in a sense,

though, I'd like to see it
more as an autobiography.

You know, it's what
I'm involved with
at any given moment.

Leave that open.

I did this
in a shop window.

This is Hockney,
and this is a young
film directress from LA.

I remember this one time
we were at his studio

and he said, "Do you wanna see
my private stuff?"

At that point, all of
his stuff was very taboo.

None of this stuff was
out in public when he was
showing it to us.

It wasn't. It wasn't.
Yeah.

Robert lived not too far
east of my apartment,

so I just walked there.

I remember, as I got
closer and closer,

that I felt
increasingly more frightened.

I was a bit anxious,
and I look up

and there's Robert
up on the fire escape,
smoking a cigarette,

and I was like,
"Okay, here we go."

A hand-operated elevator.

Five flights.

Very low lit. Devil figures.

Mysterious. It's creepy.

The first thing
that struck me about him,

he was not at all,
you know, the kind of person

that one might think
might make these kind
of photographs.

Yeah. Well, this...
This will pick up?

Yeah, this will
pick up better.

Okay. Now...

He said,
"oh, is that a Sony?"

And I said,
"No, it's not,"
and he said,

"Oh, Panasonic.
Well, Sony is better."

And, you know, teased me
about having the wrong
tape recorder.

In his early work,
Mapplethorpe signed with an X,

so there's a kind of
double entendre here.

Each portfolio, there's
13 gelatin sliver prints
mounted on black board

and signed in graphite.

Sex is, for me,

probably the most
important thing in life.

You know, it's the one area
that offers a bit of magic,

a bit of something
we don't know about.

Just seeing how
his little brother reacted,

he just-- he dug it.

He loved to get
a jolt out of people
and a reaction

because it was power.
They were powerful.

I think sexuality,
like I portray it,

is very much today,
but people, you know,

it would take a few years
before people realize that.

And you don't think
that you're just existing

in a specialized
kind of subculture?

New York is specialized.

but what happens
in New York is indicative
of America finally.

If I was gonna pick an image
that I thought was humorous,

I would pick the man
in the rubber suit with a hose
coming out of his mouth.

That's really disgusting.

I had grown up with abstract
art, and conceptualism,

and, you know,
nude men in rubber suits

were not part
of my art education.

So it was hard to know
how to talk about them.

Yeah, I was always
amazed that it shocked.

I mean, because once
I had a photograph
and I had taken it,

it didn't-- it wasn't
shocking to me anymore.

I'd been through
the experience.

Just watching me.

Even though I was perhaps
being tested that day,

I wasn't going to fail.

And then I was, like,
"You know, this is cool.

This is cool."

Maybe they're the best

or the most important
pictures I've taken.

When one sees something
you've never seen before,
it's rather important.

I mean, still, I can
show those to people

and they will have never
seen that image before.

So it opens something up,

and I think
that's what art is about,
is opening something up.

A couple of times, he's like,
"So what do you think Dad
would say about that one?"

There are two
that particularly,

you know,
took my breath away.

One was the pinky
inserted into a penis.

That was like, "Oh, my God."

And the other one
was the fist.

Okay, Robert.

I guess you've definitely
found your voice.

I wanted to do a great
fist fucking photograph,

so I did that picture,

and then he said,
"Now, it's your turn."

So he sort of pinned me
against the wall
and says, "Listen..."

Anyway, once I had
the picture taken,

I thought it was
a really good picture of me.

But most people would say
that that image was horrible.

Image of yourself.
But once they--

It's a good one.

Robert, he said "I can't have
you go home without giving
Mom and Dad something."

So he just went...

and signed it,
"For Mom and Dad."

It was certainly better than
anything else they he had
up on the wall. Sorry.

It was
an "Easter Lilies" print.

Are you proud
of your son?

For the artwork
he did, yes.

But for some of
the photographs that he took,

I just could not accept
them either.

He's done
a beautiful job on flowers.

There was tension.
There was no doubt about it.

One time in particular
being very, very uncomfortable

because my father
wouldn't look at Robert.

My father was
an electrical engineer.

He wore one of
those penholders.

Robert would make
his attempts.

He came with
a Polaroid camera one time

and gave the camera
to my father to--
he did a Polaroid of Robert.

After he left,
my father making mention

of how Robert
shook people's hands.

It wasn't a manly handshake.

It was a soft-set handshake.

Let me say this,

that I thought he was,
for quite a length of time,

but I would never even
mention it to my wife.

Because as far as
my wife is concerned,

he was her favorite.

He and Patti told my parents
they were married.

I remember sending
her birthday cards.

Patti, whatever,
Mrs. Robert Mapplethorpe.

You know?

I think my father always
had suspicions though.

He said, "There's no pictures,
there's no, you know,
there's no certificate."

Did you resent
the fact that he was gay?

I did, yes.

I guess I did, yeah.

He never spoke
to me about it.

Because I guess he knew
I would never accept it.

Admitting that he was gay
or telling me that he's gay,

that wouldn't have
helped matters at all.

Because I probably would've
had more resentment

to that fact
if he had told me.

So he was really
not part of the family,

you know, and it's sad.

It's sad. I so wish,

I could talk to him now
about it all, you know?

But Robert did-- Robert always
wanted to be famous

and he became famous.

"Dear Lloyd, I finally have
a gallery in New York.

"It's run by a woman
named Holly Solomon,

"You probably have
never heard of it,

but it doesn't seem to be
a bad place to be
for the moment."

I said,
"Before I show your work,

I would like you to do
my portrait."

And when he took my portrait,

I was convinced
that he was an artist,

convinced that he could
manipulate people
extremely well.

And I use the word manipulate.

And so I said
"Okay, let's do a show."

"Sam Wagstaff was a great
photography collector."
Holly Solomon said,

"I wouldn't have touched
Robert without Sam.

"And there were others like me
who felt the same way."

He had two shows in one day.

One was the S&M pictures,

and then one where
the pictures, for, you know,
the uptown trade.

And then there was a dinner
that Sam gave, a black-tie
dinner at One Fifth Avenue.

It was very carefully
thought out. It was like
an ad campaign,

and it worked.

Sometimes, I think it's better

for the public to be able
to separate things

because when you mix them
all up, the sex thing
overpowers it,

and what happens is they just
pick the sex pictures out
and that becomes the show.

What will you say
to those people

who accuse you
of having a dirty mind?

Well, I don't know what--
I don't know what that
means exactly.

I mean, I think everybody is,
in one way or another,
involved in sexuality.

So, if you believe
that sex is dirty,

everybody has
a dirty mind, I suppose.

But I never consider
sex being dirty.

The image that
particularly riveted me,

was Mark Stevens
(Mr. 10 1/2),

with his penis and balls
laid out on the pedestal

as if they were a work of art,
which, in his case, they were.

So...

Artistic photography
is controlled

by very civilized people
in New York City.

And in essence, he was
glamorizing the penis,

which is a very
uncivilized thing to do.

We sold one, only.

So, I bought
the whole show from Robert

figuring "Okay,
stuck is stuck."

He said,
"I want to go uptown,"

and he brought me a present.

The present was
a self-portrait with
the whip up his... tush.

And my husband,
he was quite insulted,

and he said, "I'm gonna
rip it up," and I said,
"No, you're not.

Someday, I'm gonna
get handsomely paid
for that photograph."

Is that making
a statement about myself?

You know, it's one aspect
of everybody, I suppose,

you know,
sort of the demon within.

There's a sense of humor
in what I'm doing,

which I hope
people pick up on,

and sometimes they do,
and I'm always pleased
when people see that.

I don't think he could've
produced the work he produced

if he hadn't been
raised Catholic.

I think the way I arrange
things is very Catholic,

even though I was
never a religious person.

I think it's rather important
as an influence on my life.

The imagery was what was
important to him,

not the dogma.

There's something
very ritualistic
about sadomasochism.

It's, kind of, the Black Mass
basically, right?

His S&M work is based
on the Catholic martyrology.

As grade-school children,
we hear tales

of St. Agatha tied to a stake
and her tits torn off
with a red hot pincher.

If you're a little kid
and hear that, and twisted
in a certain way,

all of a sudden,
you're excited
and not horrified.

I'm really not, you know,
into sadomasochism, you know?

I don't encourage it
with other people either.

But I really felt as though
there was a struggle in Robert

between crucifixes
and devil images.

Good, evil, there is
a great conflict there.

He liked the fact
that I had been in
the seminary for many years

and was an ordained exorcist
in the Catholic Church.

And because I was trained
to be a priest, he was very
confessional to me.

"Dear Jack, it's midnight.

"MDA ingested, only the first
signs now visible.

"I've been out nearly
every night. Tonight is
no different.

"The Mine Shaft is beckoning.

"Come, go, come, go,
come with me.

"Oh, I almost
forgot to tell you,

"I let some creep
stick his hand up my ass.

"I've been fisted, even came.

"But I think I prefer
being the giver.

"In fact, I can't help but
give preferential treatment
to the feeding process.

"I want to see
the devil in us all.

"That's my real turn-on.

Love, Robert."

I have to say that
because nobody will say it.

I have to say it
and it's not to put him down,

but it's simply to reveal.

Robert--

Satan to him was not
this evil monster.

Satan was, like,
a convivial playmate,

having a jolly good time
seducing the maidens.

To me, it was
a bridge too far.

Go away.

Can we close the doors?
I'm getting awfully
cold in here.

Yeah.
There's a draft-- Marc?

San Francisco, 1978.

Robert was having a show,
it was a sex show.

It was unusual. I mean,
you didn't see sex as art
in galleries.

And then someone said,
"Well, you know,

"he did the album cover
for 'Horses.'"

And it was the only
black and white album cover.

And to see
an androgynous-looking woman

with a jacket
over her shoulder,

I just love, love,
love that photograph.

Robert was holding court
and he said,

"Well, let's have
dinner the following night,"

and that's how I met him.

And then I guess
you wanna know what happened
the following night, right?

He reminded me of the satyr.

He really looked like
a mythological creature,

like half goat, half man.

To be in Robert's world,

you either had to be rich,
famous, or sex.

I wasn't rich,
I wasn't famous,

so, it left that.

As he certainly
wasn't monogamous,

he could have multiple
relationships on a weekend.

But with me, there was no S&M.

It was about being close

and spooning and, you know,

just the normal, the normal
kind of intimate stuff

that he didn't have
from picking up strangers.

He said,
"I want to do a nude."

So I said, "Why don't
we do something, like,
you know, this--"

those pictures of the hunt,
you know,

where you have,
like, the harvest
with the dead rabbit

and the fruit and everything
all and about.

So, I thought it was gonna be
more like that,

and then it turned up
with-- just this dead rabbit.

And I said, "What am I gonna
do with this? Like a mink
stole or something."

I'm surprised you even
know that picture,

because you'll never see
a picture of me in any book
by Mapplethorpe.

You really won't.

The fact that I started
getting a reputation

aside from just being
"Robert's cute with,"
from San Francisco,

how dare I become
a photographer that was
well known?

This infuriated him.

He couldn't deal with that.

"I've had a houseguest
here for much too long,

"a very cute boy
that I met in San Francisco.

"He's sweet, intelligent,
has a nice cock,

"but that ain't enough.

I wish he'd find an apartment
as he's cramping my style."

That was probably me.

I mean-- but I don't--
never heard that.

I mean, I don't know who else
he met in San Francisco.

That was-- that's the first
time I'm hearing that.

Hmm.

Well, it finally isn't
enough, is it? I mean,
what he wanted.

It's never enough.

Everything was a means
to an end to his career.

Everything.

Oh, my God. You guys
are old school. I love that.

The Bond Street loft
never changed.

In the front, it was
sort of no man's land,

and that was where
he used to photograph a lot.

Then you move back and it's
this little sitting area

which-- where he would
always hold court,

but across from that
was the bedroom.

Painted black.
Black.

Hot gloss.

With the handcuff holds
above the bed.

I never went in there.
Oh, I did.

First thing he said to me is,
"All you have to know is
where the darkroom is."

You know? Okay, dude,
whatever, you know.

Do your thing, I'll do mine.

And I remember the first image
I printed,

which was just a nasty,
dirty picture.

It's a guy laying on his back,
pulling on his nipples.

It's not a well-known picture,
but it's a classic.

And that was where
we went to work every day.

That's where we went.
You know,
"Off to work, here we go."

Little WASPy blondes
going to the den iniquity.

Going to
the fist-fucking file.

Wasn't it funny how soon
we became anesthetized

to all the sex pictures?
To the word penis?

Yeah, you really...
'Cause it was just daily.

There would always
be film in the morning

from the night before,

so the first thing I'd do
is process film.

He'd come in in his robe,

"How are the films, Tom?"

When he saw the image
for the very first time,

he'd tease me,
"What do you think
of that cock, Tom?"

I'm like,
"Get the fuck out of here."
You know?

I was just out of school,
looking for work,

and Robert was, like,
"I don't know how
I really feel about this,

"but I am looking
for an assistant."

And I started the next day.

Because he didn't have
a real photo background,

he was always insecure
about "Technically did
I get the picture?"

You know, "Did it come out?
Did it come out?"

If it had light on it,
and he could get an exposure,
he was happy,

'cause, you know,
they were all fucked up
in the middle of the night.

I'm not a technician.
I never studied photography.

I don't particularly
care to know it.

I know what a fine print is.

I would probably have less
than half the number
of photographs

if I did my own
developing and printing.

But he always had coke.
I was the only guy
he gave coke to

'cause he wanted
me to keep going.

He wasn't generous,
but, you know,

"If I gave Tom a little coke,
he'll print faster," you know.

"Here, Tom.
Go in the darkroom,"
he'd give me a bump.

You know,
my father said to me,

"How can Robert call himself
a photographer

if he doesn't even know how
to process a roll of film?"

But Robert had a vision,

he always had a certain
way of seeing things,

so how you got there didn't
really concern him so much.

He wanted everything
to just be flawless.

You know, "Let's make this
guy's arm meet this corner,"

and, you know,
"Let's straighten it
out a little bit."

But it's a guy pissing
in another guy's mouth.
What's the fucking difference?

He wanted things as, you know,
unrealistically perfect

and smooth and take all
the flaws out of the skin.

Some days we'd sit
and just retouch for a day

until all the blemishes
were gone.

I talked to Patti
about doing a book

and having her
transform herself

into all these different
characters that would have
been Patti.

I mean, she would be
this character one day

and that character another.

And I think, you know,
she had a certain range

that could've probably
carried a whole book,

but I never
did a book with her.

When I met Lisa, I realized
that she, in fact, had this
range within her,

a very different range, but it
was still worthy of a book.

I thought she was unique.

She had this form that I had
never seen before.

It was like
a complete new animal.

Martineau:
She was particularly
important to Mapplethorpe

because he was
trying to balance out
his sex pictures

with pictures of women.
Mm-hmm.

It's so interesting
to think about

how the female body building
idea then was really radical

and, kind of, challenging.

That kind of physique to us
doesn't seem so shocking.
Right.

She's such
a prominent subject.

Very '80s,
the make-up, the hair.
Oh, yeah.

The ruffle blouse.
Mm-hmm.

The shoulder pads.

Lyon:
It was prototype
for a new species.

Sort of an animal perfection,
and I felt in him

a kind of male version
of the same thing.

My ambition that
I discussed with him

was to explore
the range of possibilities

of ways of viewing a woman.

Historical ways,
contemporary ways,

cliché ways, unheard of ways,

tribal ways,
the high fashion type,

the sex goddess type,
the lingerie type,

the bondage type,
the virgin type,

the bridal type,
the statue type.

What had seemed
very daring

when he did it with men...

...looked very retrograde
when he did it with a woman

who was dressing up in
different hats and garments.

And so I wrote about that
and he was furious.

I think he called me
and yelled at me.

I feel, like, it may
have been a bad idea
to write that review.

I mean, that is
sculpture to me,

you know, and that's, sort of,
one of the points that
I'm making in photography

is being a sculptor
without actually having
to spend all the time,

sort of, modeling
with your hands.

You know, that's much
too archaic for me.

It's like inventing sculpture
myself with a camera.

It really is like bronze.

I'd often say that
photographing black men
is like photographing bronzes.

I was the last white
intimate person in his life.

After that, he was only
sleeping with black people,

photographing black people.

He became obsessed
with black people.

All I know is that it's
physically attractive to me.

Visually, it's also attractive

and so, you know, it became
an obsession with me taking
these pictures of blacks.

People had accused him
of exploiting these people.

And, um... he told me

he photographed
what he loved to do

and the people
he loved to be with,

and to me,
that's not exploitation.

That's just living your life

and using a camera
to document it.

For the most part, when whites
have photographed blacks,

they have, sort of,
shown them from a certain
social point of view.

I'm photographing them as form
in the same way that
I'm reading the flowers

or anything else
that I photograph.

I'm not attempting to make
a social statement
about their plight.

Robert was looking for God
in a black man,

and he found him
in Milton Moore

and fell in love with him.

Now, I think he fell in love,

and this sounds ridiculous,
with Milton's penis.

Robert was looking
for the absolute perfect
black penis.

And he had it,

I mean, the exact
measurements down.

I mean, it had to be
just so and he'd discuss it
with others,

and, you know,
the ratio to this and that.

The thing the world is
most afraid of is penis.

And Robert dared show penis,

but he dared show black penis,

and there's nothing more scary
because behind all of
sexual prejudice

is the sex envy,
this penis envy

that drives people insane

either with lust or with fear.

Milton did say to him

as one condition
of taking the pictures

that he could not show
his head in the frame.

"Picture of Man
in Polyester Suit"

was really
one of his most famous.

Milton had picked up
that suit in Hong Kong
and was very proud of it,

and Robert purposely
lined up his thumb

so that it would show off
the cheap seams.

I'd never seen it, and then
we went to the framers

and I saw it laying on
the floor as it was gonna
be put into the frame,

and I said,

"Robert, this is a show that
the whole world will see."

He said to me,
"Will anyone write about it?"

That was his comment.
And they did.

"Main picture here is
a big black dude

"seen in an expensive vested
gabardine suit

"with his fly open and his
elephant cock sticking out.

"This picture's ugly,
degrading, obscene,

"typical of the artist's work,

"which appeal
largely to drooling
lascivious collectors

"who buy them and return
to their furnished rooms
to jerk off."

We actually did
sell that picture
during the exhibition

to a collector
in New York for $2,500,
and it was a reach.

It was a big price
for a photograph,

and especially
by a living photographer.

There were 20
works in the show

and we placed all of them
with very strong collectors,

which was very
important for Robert.

This was the first show that
that had ever happened to him.

And it was a kind
of lightning rod

and it was notorious.

Auctioneer:
Lot 144, Robert Mapplethorpe's
"Man in Polyester Suit."

And I'm gonna start
the bidding here at $180,000.

It's possibly one of the top
10 most recognizable images
in photographic history.

210, 220.

It's an iconic image.

You know, it's, like,
Andy's "Marilyn."

360, 380...

$390,000.

None of us realized
that photography

at its-- the beginning
was just considered

commercial reproduction,
commercial reproduction.

Many collectors would
never dream of collecting.

And I think Mapplethorpe is
one of the artists responsible

for photography being
considered on an equal basis
with sculpture and painting.

I never for a second
doubted that photography
was a very real art.

And there's just something
about his photography that
immediately attracted me.

I was shocked
by his absolute brutal
honesty about everything,

from sexual organs
to relationships
between people.

You know, the people that have
influenced me the most

are the relationships
I've had, you know,

the lovers
I've had in my life.

And of course
I've photographed
every one of them.

The only time Robert ever
cried was talking about
how much he loved Milton.

Not Patti, Milton. Milton.

He had just did that
show called "Black Males"
at Robert Miller Gallery.

So I went to go see that show.

I said, "That's gonna
be my boyfriend."

We lived together for
the better part of a decade.

We rarely fought, you know,

because he was too
self-absorbed to really care.

It was so easy to be
around him

because he was so busy
being Robert Mapplethorpe.

When we started seeing
each other, he started
taking pictures, right?

And I was, kind of, shy,
so I didn't wanna take
nude pictures.

And Robert goes,
"Just don't look
at your dick."

He goes,
"It's just a picture."

There is no picture
of Ken Moody's dick.

There just isn't,
and I'm sorry.

As soon as I stood
in front of the seamless,

it was magic.

It was absolute magic.

There's no way
you can describe it
other than making love.

And as soon as we stepped away
from that backdrop, nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

We had nothing in common,
We had nothing to say
to each other.

There was a ghetto
element to men that he had
the strongest attraction to.

I had none of that.

He was quoted in
an article as saying
I was too "white" for him.

Too white.

I brought them together.

It was interesting
'cause they had never met
and never had a conversation

with somebody else
that they had lost all
their hair as a child.

And it was
interesting to watch them

react and relate
to each other.

The more time goes by,

the bigger that
photograph gets.

When it was in Times Square
on the NASDAQ billboard,

that was, like,
"Wow. Where's my mother?"

I've read several things
on the shot of Ken and I.

It's like
they tried to read all
of this philosophy into it.

Black Ken, eyes closed,
meaning the subconscious.

White Robert, eyes open,
afraid of the unconscious.

I'm, like, "What?"

The black man
was in the background

because the black man's neck
wasn't long enough

to reach over
the white man's shoulder.

We tried it and my neck
wasn't long enough.

I think that's why
he did every position.

Exactly.
To find out
what worked best.

There was no
philosophical anything to--

Robert was so not like that.

No. Totally not.

Take your shirt off.

It sounds silly.
I guess, you know,
using the word, magic.

And fold your arms.

Stay right there.
Lift your head up
a little bit.

I was able to pick up
the magic of the moment
and work with it,

you know, that's my rush
in doing photography.

Ken, hold that! Hold that!

Tilt a little right
and turn a little right.

Turn your head to the right,
now bring your eyes
back to me.

Look back here.

Lean right, turn right.

Put your head down,
now bring your eyes up.

Click, click, click,
click, click, eyes to me.

Click. Chin up.

Turn this way.

Turn your head this way.
Yeah, more.

More. More.

And instead
of looking to the side,
look straight out.

Often I'm dealing
with fractions of inches.

Here, you can even--
Now turn.

Just-- Yeah,
from the neck.
Stay there.

I'm looking for
that perfect position

where the head sort of,
somehow makes sense to me.

Actually, I should take it
with all these things
coming in at you.

A little-- Look this way
towards-- yeah.

That's rather good, actually.

I'm gonna start showing
a series of portraits.

I'll stop at any point,
but I don't want to comment
too much about the pictures

'cause I wanna get-- I want
my vision to come across,

the way I see things.

That's William Burroughs.

Philip Glass on the left,
Robert Wilson on the right.

And Donald Sutherland,
one of the best subjects
I've ever photographed.

Annie Leibovitz, one of
the most difficult subjects
I've ever photographed.

That's Debbie Harry.

I sat for him
a couple of times,

which was pretty scary
for me the first time.

Smiling wasn't
his thing, you know.

The way that he saw people was
like he was seeing into them

or something,
or through them.

I don't think
it's necessary to tell you

who is in each photograph
because if the pictures
are good,

then they'll
transcend who they
are and it doesn't matter.

He became known
for the elegance
of his portraits.

And any photographer who takes
pictures of celebrities

is making a smart
business move

because those people and their
friends have lots of money.

And they buy pictures.
Yeah.

Well, and his social life was
a part of his artistic life.

That's right.
You know,

it was all
very interconnected.

Ideally, you get
the subject to a point

where they direct themselves.

You know, they say, "Well,
this is really kind of what
I want to be photographed in."

I thought it was going to be
a catastrophe,

and I prepared for it.

So I did take a piece of mine.

It was a good
collaboration, right?

Because he's famous
not for his flower pictures.

He's famous
for his objectionable
sexual representation.

You know taking pictures
of sex is no different

than photographing
a flower really.

I mean, it's the same thing.
It's just submitting
to whatever's going on

and trying to get
the best possible view of it.

And nobody else can photograph
flowers the way I do.

It's just the way I see.

Even Robert said it,
that the pictures started
getting very, very, slick.

That was the word.
So slick, so perfect.

But perfection,
that's a Mapplethorpe
characteristic. Perfection.

Anybody who was
involved in that studio
will agree with me

that you just got sucked
into Robert's world.

You wanted to.
It wasn't-- I mean,
you just did,

I mean, it was
an interesting world.

It was a lot of excitement,
it was a lot of fun,

but I wanted
to do something else.

Can't just be
Robert's assistant
for the rest of my life.

So then the invitation
gets sent out.

Nice group of artists.
All alphabetical.

And lo and behold,
Edward Mapplethorpe comes
before Robert Mapplethorpe.

And he was... ruthless.

He was nasty.

And said,

"I'm not gonna have
any kid brother--

"I've worked really hard
to get where I've gotten,

"and if you think
you're gonna come
and ride on my coattails..."

And I was like,
"Fuck, man," I was like...

"Wow."

And Robert asked him
to change his name,

which he struggled with,
I think, for a while,

but then he did.
He changed it to Maxey.

Right. But...

It was all about Robert.
It was all about Robert.

You know,
they were brothers.

Can't imagine
what all that was like.

You know, it was
a futile attempt because...

"Oh, this is Edward Maxey.
He's Robert Mapplethorpe's
brother."

I was, like, "Well,
what good is this doing?

"This is ridiculous."

But yeah, it sucked.

That day sucked.

Just like the day that he got
angry at me for deciding that
I was gonna leave the studio.

This is somebody
that two years earlier

didn't know whether he wanted
me in the studio with him.

Two years later, I guess,
he learned to rely on me
quite a bit.

And was angry, very angry.

The lifestyle of some
male homosexuals

has triggered an epidemic
of a rare form of cancer.

He would go to the bar
in the afternoon,

pick up someone,
have sex with them,

then go back later that night,

maybe and then
pick up somebody else,

and then towards
the end of the night,
like, a nightcap.

Last weekend,
Mayor Koch predicted

that The Mine Shaft
would close.

They are selling death.

Places where death
can be distributed.

They're making love
in the street on top of cars
and everything.

This is men. Grown men.
I mean, that's not normal.

Most of these people,
they're not fit,
they're not human beings.

That have emotional problems.

'Cause I was sleeping
with him for all those years,

I thought that
I was gonna die.

I came back
from an appointment
to get my results.

He was laying in the bed
when I walked in,

and then he looked at me
and then he said,

"You got it, right?"

And I said, "No, no, no, no."
I said, "I'm negative."

And I remember, he got
really upset and he goes,

"Then why do I have it?
Why do I have it?"

And he started, like,
pounding the bed.

AIDS at the time
was pretty much
a death sentence, right?

And he, on the one
hand was upset,

but on the other hand,
he was fascinated
by the demand for his work.

Like, his market took off

when people heard
that he was about to die.

It really took off.

We were very busy.

We didn't stop working,
and he didn't stop shooting

until he physically
couldn't get out of bed.

He's like,
"What am I shooting next?

"Get me some flowers.
Let's do that."

You know, and it--
the flowers got done,
the statues got done,

the commissioned
portraits got done.

One day I'll
photograph flowers,

the next day
I'll do some fashion work,

the next day I'll do some
pornography, and the next day,
I'll do a portrait.

You know, I don't really care.

I sort of thought I should
be keeping a journal.

"I did watch him shoot today.

"It's so amazing to see
how he musters the energy
to do the pictures.

"It absolutely
keeps him going.

"And the money. Funny money."

Natrele Plus. Long-lasting
Natrele protection.

He was never interested
in talking about his health.

All he wanted to talk about
was sales and who was
looking at his work,

and when are we gonna have
a million-dollar a month.

He was interested in making
as much money as possible.

And he resented the fact
that his contemporaries',
like Brice Marden,

works started selling
for several hundred
thousand dollars.

And Robert's works
were selling for $1,100.

Mapplethorpe, had a sort of
jealous or competitive
relationship with Warhol.

He would say to me weekly,

"If I die, will I have died
with as much money
as Andy Warhol had?"

And I'd say,
"No. Not nearly, not nearly."

I remember him saying to me
once, how frustrated he was
about being ill

because he was getting
all this money now,

and he actually said,

"I won't be able to enjoy it."

He was not very interested
in leaving money to people.

So the foundation idea
really began to appeal to him

because his money,
his assets, his real estate,
his art collection

would support his foundation.

So, it would
automatically promote him.

Robert sent for me
for his birthday,

his 40th birthday party,

That's when I was like,
"Whoa. This is not good."

Robert Mapplethorpe's
way to interpret me

was totally different than
any other photographer.

He wanted my hair back,
so that was unusual to me.

Everybody has always wanted me
to do a hairdo.

He wanted a very,
very natural feel.

I look like an angel
on that picture.

So, how can I not be pleased?

He was the first photographer
to photograph me completely
in profile.

It's never--
He was the only one.

The profile was just so much
more soul-baring.

I got to sort of study him.

He didn't seem happy.
Everything seemed precious,

and I think there was no sense
of wanting to waste time
or be frivolous.

In German, you say--
there is this word, getrieben,

which means as if something
is chasing you constantly.

I used to go and visit him.
We both sense that
he was dying,

but we didn't talk about it.

And he had that very
sad expression,

because
he didn't want to leave.

He wanted to stay, you know?

And one day he said,

"I need to take
a photograph of you

"and you need this one
because this is going
to be the last one,"

is what he say.
I say, "Don't be silly."

And it was.

It was just sort of

business as usual until
things progressed,

and he was having a harder
and harder time getting
out of his seat and...

And he had a horrible,
horrible cough,

which I guess was typical.

Six o'clock would roll around
and then he'd sort of be like,

"Can you come
keep me company?"

It was this little boy.
"Don't leave. Stay with me."

Yeah, little baby voice.

Robert was in his bedroom,
not feeling particularly well,

and he's like,
you know, he's like,
"I'd like to do a picture

"with my hand
holding the skull cane."

And I said to Brian,
I said, "Listen, this has got
to be a self-portrait."

And it wasn't often
that he'd want to take
his own picture,

but he had been trying.

I took the skull cane
and I held it like this,

and I said, "Do a Polaroid."

I brought it to Robert, he was
like, "Wow. That's good."

His knee started to hurt,

so we put a chair
in for him to sit on.

That's the classic
masterpiece picture.

It's a tremendous photograph,

one of the greatest
self-portraits of all time.

It's 2:38 here in the WNBC.

cloudy, breezy,
chance of showers

and thunderstorms right
through the evening.

The low tonight in the low
60s, right now, 74 degrees.

There was something
electric that day.

It wasn't just an opening.

It was a...

a memorial
with a living corpse.

Your heart
just went out to him

because here he was
having the success
that he dreamed of

from those days in
coffee shops in the Village,

and, you know,
you could tell he was dying.

Not too much.

This is-- someone took
this picture of me

taking a picture of him.

He knew what
I was doing there.

I think he understood
the whole thing.

He didn't like it,
but he understood it.

I think that was
his proudest day, I really do.

He looked like
the king sitting there.

It had everything
from flowers to fist-fucking.

And I had to go around
the room with my mother
in a wheelchair.

Wow, yeah.

When I saw
the one with the whip,

I said, "Oh, my God."

And I ran
and go to my kids and--

"That's him?
It was a self-portrait?"

He loved attention,

even though
it had to do with the fact
that he was a dying man,

it didn't matter.

It was one picture.
I mean it stunned people.

We all sort of were under
the impression it was gonna
be this glorious article,

when in fact,
that was sad.
Yeah.

I'm sure he saw
his own mortality...
Yeah.

...very clearly
at that moment.

His image out there,
this handsome, vain,
elegant creature,

and people really
were shocked.

I mean, come on, it was like,
he was alive.

Working with Robert
Mapplethorpe has been

my most enlightening

and rewarding curatorial
experience.

I felt that Robert
Mapplethorpe's work
was so important.

So I went to New York
and visited him at his studio.

We started to talk.
He was very easy to talk to.

I felt after five minutes
that I had known him
a long time.

Have you ever seen
the X, Y, Z portfolios?

There's an X portfolio
which is sex pictures,
there's 13 of them,

and then there's Y
which is flowers,

and the Z which is blacks.

He was particularly interested
in showing the X, Y, Z series,

which had not been shown
before in its entirety.

It may be interesting
to have a wall

where you have
a row of X, Y, and Z

on one mass, sort of,
in three rows of something.

We devised a way
of displaying them

in a case that would
be so high that a child
could not see into it,

but an adult could
look down upon it.

I remember showing my husband
some of the pictures

before the exhibition opened.

He said, "Janet, do you
know what you're doing?"

But I didn't listen to him.
Maybe I was crazy.

Hi, Robert!

Here we are.
You're with us.

You're with us
and we're with you.

I think you can tell
whether a show is successful
by the sound in the gallery.

If people are talking a lot,
you know, somehow the show
just doesn't have it.

In the Mapplethorpe show,
there was silence.

You could hear a pin drop.

This one time, it was
a terrible night for Robert

and he was almost
hallucinating a bit

and he ended up pulling out
some of the IVs,

so I had blood dripping
out of his arm, and IVs,

and I had to-- he-- I know
I had to clean him up.

He'd shat in the bed,
and I'm like, "Oh, my God."

That night, Robert looked
at me teary-eyed, crying,

and said, "Oh, my God."
He's like, "I'm dying.

"I'm dying."
And I had to say, "Yeah."

What could you--
I couldn't-- I mean, "Yes."

Robert gave a going-away
party for himself,

a lavish cocktail party
at his loft.

Waiters walking
around with silver trays

with a little tiny Bellini
and caviar and champagne.

It was very elegant.

And Robert was sitting
in the middle of the room.

I walked up to him
and kneeled down at his feet

and came
face-to-face with him.

He said,
"You still look so beautiful."

And I said, "Thank you."

I said, "What do you
want me to do?"

He said, "I want you
to tell her everything.

Keep me alive."

"March 8th.
Well, this is it.

"The last two days
have been hell.

"The funny part is not knowing
how to say goodbye.

"Letting go.
Are words enough?"

I was just like,
"Come on, Robert."

Just like have
a conversation with me

and just say, "You know what,
I'm proud of you,

and just keep it going,
and just do good work."

And... never got it.

Never got it.

Some days, yes,
and some days, no.

You know, on a daily basis,

I would say in any given day,
I'm happy part of the time

and not the rest, you know.

I think I'm a perfectionist
and I think it's hard
to be happy

if you like things
to be perfect

because things
are not perfect.

I don't know whether
the television cameras
can see it or not.

I'm gonna be fast enough
with it that they can't.

But I want senators to come
over here, if they have
any doubt

and look at the pictures.

Keep your hands off!

I don't even
acknowledge that it's art.

Keep your hands off!
Get your hands off!

I don't even acknowledge

that the fellow who did it
was an artist.

I think he was a jerk.

Keep your hands off!
Get your hands off!

Keep your hands off!
Keep your hands off!

Keep your hands off!
Keep your hands off!

This line is
for two o'clock only.

You need a pass to get in
to see the exhibition.

It happened.

What you're watching now
is the Cincinnati Police as
they made their move today

against The Contemporary
Arts Center.

They temporarily closed

the controversial
Robert Mapplethorpe exhibit

that resulted in charges today
against The Contemporary Arts
Center and its director.

It's an important exhibition.
It's important for this city

that it be seen here.

It was suggested that I wear
a bulletproof vest.

There would be calls to
the home or calls to my office

saying, "We're gonna
kill your children."

The art gallery
and its director

are charged with obscenity
for exhibiting photographs by
the late Robert Mapplethorpe.

The jury took about two hours
to come up with its decision.

We, the jury in this case,
find the defendant not guilty

of pandering obscenity.

Order! Order!

Next up is the Robert
Mapplethorpe Flag,

the great "Star-Spangled
Banner," gelatin silver print,

for $48,000.
Now goes to 48,000,

48,000, 50, 55,000,
60, 65,000. Thank you, ma'am.

He was always
giving me his work.

$70,000 with Caroline.

I had, at least, half a dozen
photographs and a collage.

$70,000.

Don't ask me what
I did with this, please,

because if I kept it,
I wouldn't be here.
I'd be in my villa in Tuscany.

I can't discuss,
too upsetting.

Sold!

I threw it away.

Sold!

When I moved.

Sold!

I told this once
to an art dealer.

And he said, "I can't believe
you didn't know

"that someone as ambitious as
Robert-- as clearly ambitious,
wouldn't become famous."

And I said, "No one
could have imagined

"that photographs would
be so valuable financially."

Because they weren't.
No photographs were.

It wasn't just
that I couldn't imagine it.
No one could imagine it.

Whatever it took
to become Robert Mapplethorpe

is what it was gonna take

and it took
his life to do it...

Literally.

Mapplethorpe by himself,
the name is really great.

It's like Titian or Piranesi.

Just the name,
that's all you need

is the last name
to recognize the artist.

It's so clear and simple.

What if you stacked
three images into the...

We can't have nudity
on the street banners
'cause the city regulations.

So that's one point
of discussion,
second is the color.

This is a mock-up
of the invitation
for our opening reception.

His self-portrait
on the front,
then inside message.

Then the RSVP card.

It's just an innocuous flower,
not anything that the Post
Office would object to.

I'm not planning to put
a curtain, but I'm sure

there'll be some kind
of warning on the gallery
as people go in.

Well, and with her holding
her sculpture.

-Oh, that was purposeful.
-Yeah, it's so great.

I wanted to put
Louise Bourgeois holding
her sculpture, Lafayette,

which looks like a phallus,
next to the picture of
"Man in the Polyester Suit."

-Yes, with his actual phallus.
-It's a curatorial pun.