Mapplethorpe

Robert Mapplethorpe began taking photographs in 1970 with a Polaroid camera given to him by a friend. Nearly twenty years later, when Mapplethorpe died at the age of forty-two, he was considered one of the most important photographers of his time, his elegant,sometimes shocking nudes and images of sexual sadomasochism had been exhibited widely and were the subject of serieus critical attention in Europe and America.