Mapplethorpe presented the body as a sexual object, separating it from the humanity of the person. He added nothing to photography as a medium. I hold his work in low regard.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I may be wrong, but the essential illustrative nature of most documentary photography, and the worship of the object per se, in our best nature photography, is not enough to satisfy the man of today, compounded as he is of Christ, Freud, and Marx.
Photography deals exquisitely with appearances, but nothing is what it appears to be.
When I first became interested in photography, I thought it was the whole cheese. My idea was to have it recognized as one of the fine arts. Today I don't give a hoot in hell about that. The mission of photography is to explain man to man and each man to himself.
Whether he is an artist or not, the photographer is a joyous sensualist, for the simple reason that the eye traffics in feelings, not in thoughts.
Photography is more than a medium for factual communication of ideas. It is a creative art.
Photography started as a means of getting reference material for my paintings of nature subjects.
In photography, the smallest thing can be a great subject. The little, human detail can become a Leitmotiv.
Photography is a major force in explaining man to man.
Like Robert Mapplethorpe, Helmut Newton, and so many others before me, sexual imagery has always been a part of my photography.
The artist is the medium between his fantasies and the rest of the world.