ABSTRACT This dissertation explores how the Mapplethorpe Controversy – a term used here to signify the broader curatorial, artistic, intellectual, political and social issues that led to and arose out of the now notorious 1989 retrospective, Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment – changed photography. I situate the controversy as a flashpoint within the Culture Wars and explore how institutions explicitly and implicitly create and circulate myths. I argue that the Mapplethorpe Controversy, along with the intense political and public responses in Congress, the national media, Supreme Court and academic press indicate that at stake was not the art, per se, but the deep-seated social fears posed by the bodies, real and imaginary, represented in this art and their explicit relationship to the terms of alternative identity politics and its potential disruption to the traditional social order. This dissertation contributes to the existent scholarship that surrounds Robert Mapplethorpe and his work, and uses the controversy it generated as an anchor for exploring questions about the social and political stakes of cultural representation. What does American culture look like? What should it look like? Who does American culture represent and who should it represent? These were the questions of the Mapplethorpe Controversy, the questions of the Culture Wars. They are the questions we face. What the Mapplethorpe Controversy exposed was that art participates in public life and "art people” - artists, critics, art historians, curators - must acknowledge rather than deny this exchange. i ii ©Copyright by Jordan Mintz, 2021 All Rights Reserved ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank Michael Plante for his advice, guidance and patience. This project is very much the culmination of the countless conversations held in classrooms and coffee shops throughout the past decade. I would also like to sincerely thank my other committee members, Michelle Foa, Menaka Philips and Molly Travis. Their insights and advice not only shaped this dissertation but my academic identity and interests. This project would not have been possible without the continued support of the Newcomb Art Department and the Tulane School of Liberal Arts. On a more personal note, I would like to thank my parents, Robin and David Mintz, and my siblings, Joshua and Jenna, for their unrelenting support in all that I do. My mom always encouraged us to study something we would enjoy and be proud of. I certainly hope the results are worthy. I would also like to sincerely thank my fellow members of FFFCC, especially Hayley Woodward, Emily Hogrefe-Ribeiro and Anthony Cooper. Their support – whether as sounding boards, stress relievers, or running partners – proved pivotal to my sanity. I would be remiss to not mention the friends who quickly became family in Walla Walla, Washington. While I was going through some of my most difficult times, they believed in me and were always ready to celebrate the highs, lows and everything in between. To Nikki and Dana, thank you for transforming everyday into a (usually) friendly competition. To Melissa, who was perhaps most subjected to the stress levels I could not hide, thank you for listening to every idea, thought, and i ii complaint and always providing the snacks. To Matt, thank you for offering me a space where I could comfortably take a breath and for all the chats that followed. To Catelyn and Cam, thank you for the countless dinners and reminders that I was not yet done. I would also like to thank my best friend, Tucker G. Mintz. He listened to every developing idea without ever voicing a single word of complaint. This one is for you. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS…………………………………………………………….…i LIST OF FIGURES………………….…………………………...………………………iv CHAPTERS INTRODUCTION: THE STORY………………………………………………...1 CHAPTER ONE: THE EDGE OF GLORY……………………………..………11 CHAPTER TWO: A STAR IS BORN…………………………………………..67 CHAPTER THREE: IN THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM………………109 CHAPTER FOUR: REPUTATION……………………………………………159 CHAPTER FIVE: HOMECOMING……………………………………….….205 CONCLUSION: AT LAST………………………………………………….…256 BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………………………260 iii List of Figures Fig. 1.1 Robert Mapplethorpe, Self-Portrait, N.Y.C., 1978 Fig. 2.1. Robert Mapplethorpe, Untitled (Self Portrait), 1972 Fig. 2.2. Robert Mapplethorpe, Untitled, [Invitation to Light Gallery Opening], January 6, 1973 Fig. 2.3 Robert Mapplethorpe, Bull’s Eye front cover from Gay Power, Volume 1, Number 16 Fig. 2.4 Robert Mapplethorpe, Self Portrait [Invitation to Pictures held at the Holly Solomon Gallery and the Kitchen], 1977 Fig. 2.5 Press Release from Pictures held at the Kitchen Center for Video and Music, February 5-19, 1977 Fig. 2.6. Mapplethorpe, Mark Stevens (Mr. 10 ½), 1976 Fig. 2.7 Robert Mapplethorpe, Charles and Jim Kissing, 1974 Fig. 2.8 Robert Mapplethorpe, Self Portrait (with Bullwhip) [Invitation for Censored Exhibition held at 80 Langton Street, San Francisco] March 1978 Fig. 2.9. Review of Censored, published in the The Advocate, 1978 Fig. 2.10 Mapplethorpe, Jim, Sausalito, 1977 Fig. 2.11. Advertisement for Robert Miller’s X and Y Portfolios, Robert Miller Gallery, New York; published in Artforum magazine, vol. 17, no. 9 (April 1979) Fig. 3.1 Protest of the cancellation of Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment, June 30, 1989, Washington, D.C. Fig. 3.2 Andres Serrano, Piss Christ, 1987 Fig. 3.3 Robert Mapplethorpe, Rosie, 1976 Fig. 3.4 Robert Mapplethorpe, Jesse McBride, 1976 Fig. 3.5 The Christian Coalition, “To the Congress of the United States,” The Washington Post, June 20, 1990 iv v Fig. 3.6 Robert Mapplethorpe, Jim and Tom, Sausalito, 1977 Fig. 3.7 Robert Mapplethorpe, Helmut and Brooks, 1978 Fig. 3.8 Robert Mapplethorpe, Lou, N.Y.C., 1978 Fig. 4.1 David Wojnarowicz, Untitled (Genet), 1990 Fig. 4.2 The Christian Coalition, “Is This How You Want Your Tax Dollars Spent,” USA Today, Mach 28, 1990 Fig. 5.1 Cindy Sherman, Untitled #263, 1992 Fig. 5.2 Cindy Sherman, Untitled #250, 1992 Fig. 5.3 Glenn Ligon, Red Portfolio, 1993 Fig. 5.4 Ryan McWilliams, “A photo of a man urinating in another man's mouth. Glenn Ligon Red Portfolio #shameless #selfie #newmuseum #art #nyc”. May 16, 2013. https://twitter.com/rhmrpanic/status/335240913183969280 Fig. 5.5 Glenn Ligon, Notes on the Margin of the Black Book, 1991-1993 Fig. 5.6 Lyle Ashton Harris, Constructs, 1989 Fig. 5.7 Robert Mapplethorpe, Charles Edward Bowman, N.Y.C., 1980 Fig. 5.8 Lyle Ashton Harris, Constructs #10, 1987-88 Fig. 5.9 Carrie Mae Weems, From Here I Saw and I Cried, 1995-6 Fig. 5.10 Carrie Mae Weems, “Anything but what you were ha” from From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried, 1995-1996 Fig. 5.11 Carrie Mae Weems, From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried, 1995-1996. Installation view, First Center for the Visual Arts, Nashville, Tennessee, 2012. Fig. 5.12 Carrie Mae Weems, From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried, 1995-1996. v 1 INTRODUCTION: The Story I still remember the first time I saw Robert Mapplethorpe’s Self-Portrait, N.Y.C. (fig. 1.1). An alluring image with the ability to challenge and disrupt, it is a photograph that represents everything I love about the study of art history. The photographic self- portrait invites readings of authenticity, indexicality, and truth, as only photographs do. His body is twisted and echoes the shape of the whip that he holds. His gaze, turned directly at the camera, is both authoritative and awkward, as he strains to look over his shoulder. He is both subject and object, photographer and sitter. He is anally penetrable by the bullwhip, defying the sexual and gender taboos that render him vulnerable, and yet he is simultaneously in control. He inserted the bullwhip. He chooses to keep it there. He orchestrates what we see. He captures the image. It is a piece that is formally satisfying, culturally controversial and resolutely confrontational. It is the piece that I, like many others, associate with the artist that the Culture Wars and its actors made famous. An artist defined, postmortem, by a moment where gender, sexuality, photography, politics and religion intersected and collided on the national stage against and shaped by the backdrop of a country engaged in a Culture War, debating what it means to be American. Likewise, this dissertation’s aim was never to create, construct, or imply the logical connections that monographic studies precipitate, but to use the work and the controversy it generated as an anchor for exploring questions about the social and 1 2 political stakes of cultural representation.1 When I initially proposed the topic, I felt it would be meaningful. My aim was never to create a writing of the past, but a writing of the past for the present, not to uncover whether certain narratives are “true,” but to establish the political, epistemological, and ontological work they actively participate in producing. I could never have anticipated what would occur while this project was in progress. In terms of Robert Mapplethorpe, it should be noted that as this dissertation was in process, so too was the work that culminated in the two-part exhibition, Implicit Tensions: Mapplethorpe Now, held at the Guggenheim Museum. The first part, held in the early half of 2019, was filled with Mapplethorpe’s Polaroids, collages and photographs. The second half of that show, spanning July 2019 through mid-January 2020, pared and paired a more focused selection of Mapplethorpe’s work, showcasing it alongside the work of artists who engage with Mapplethorpe formally, aesthetically, as well as subjectively. While I had no part in that show, it very much had a part in this dissertation. Implicit Tensions introduced, explored, and tested some of the tensions I too was working through.