Robert Mapplethorpe - Photographs London Friday, May 19, 2023 | Phillips

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  • Provenance

    Robert Miller Gallery, New York
    Mulier Mulier Gallery, Knokke-Heist, 2002

  • Literature

    Robert Mapplethorpe, 1970-83, London: ICA, 1983, p. 35
    A. Danto, Mapplethorpe, Kempen: teNeues, 2007, p. 93, 331
    Robert Mapplethorpe, London: Phaidon, 2020, p. 362

  • 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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PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE EUROPEAN COLLECTION

43

Frank Diaz

1979
Gelatin silver print, mounted.
35.3 x 35.3 cm (13 7/8 x 13 7/8 in.)
Signed, dated and numbered 7/10 in pencil in the margin; signed, dated in ink, copyright credit reproduction limitation stamp on the reverse of the mount.

Estimate
£5,000 - 7,000 

Sold for £6,350

Contact Specialist

Rachel Peart
Head of Department, London
RPeart@phillips.com

Yuka Yamaji
Head of Photographs, Europe
YYamaji@phillips.com

General Enquiries
+44 20 7318 4092

Photographs

London Auction 19 May 2023