Robert Mapplethorpe: A Season in Hell / Opening and Performance by Patti Smith

“Drawing on the Catholic culture of his upbringing, Mapplethorpe was inspired to make shrine-like works out of a broad range of materials, from menʼs underwear to prayer cards. However these works, both formally and substantially, become transformed more into objects of fetish than images of devotion, revealing the incessant influence of his religious background on Mapplethorpeʼs life and art, and his irreverent and rebellious relationship to it. As Mapplethorpe himself said ‘A church has a certain magic and mystery for a child…. It still shows in how I arrange things. Itʼs always little altars.’ … Later in his career Mapplethorpe became more renowned for his photography, yet the themes of Heaven and Hell, the sacrehis work.” (Excerpt from the press release).

Robert Mapplethorpe: A Season in Hell / Opening and Performance by Patti Smith. Alison Jacques Gallery, London / UK. October 13, 2009.