Robert Mapplethorpe

Robert Mapplethorpe was an American born on March 9th, 1989. He studied Fine Arts at Pratt Institute in New York where he focused on graphic design, but dropped out before he was able to finish his degree. He was most well-known for his black and white photography and his self portrait series (wikipedia).


    The first image I am choosing to look at is this one. One thing I really like about this photograph is the extreme contrast. The black background behind the very light face is very compositionally interesting. Another thing I really like about this photography is the long exposure that he used. The blur of the face as he looks to the right and then more forward really creates a sense of movement. I also know from experience how hard it is to work with long exposure so this is even more impressive to me since I’ve struggled with it before.




    The other photograph I am choosing to talk about is this one. Once again, I feel like Mapplethorpe does a really good job putting attention into his backgrounds. I think the back background on his photos really creates a feeling of seriousness that otherwise would not have been achieved. Additionally, I really like how he incorporated flowers into this image. Even though it is a portrait of someone, I think the flowers symbolize a deeper meaning of beauty and also growth as they come out of her hair.


Overall I really like Mapplethorpe’s work with portraits. I know how difficult then can be to successfully execute but he does a really nice job on focusing on all aspects of them. His attention to detail with the lighting, backgrounds, tone, poses and more really make him successful in this area of photography.


 

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