Robert Mapplethorpe: Pictures
Serralves Museum, Porto
20 September 2018 – 6 January 2019
Robert Mapplethorpe will have his first exhibition in Portugal, at the Serralves Museum, Porto, from 20 September 2018 – 6 January 2019. The exhibition is organised by the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art and curated by João Ribas, Museum Director. Conceived in partnership with the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, New York, the exhibition will be a large-scale retrospective of Mapplethorpe’s work, featuring some of the most iconic photographs from the 20th century.
Offering an overview of his pioneering work, the exhibition includes his studio portraits - from self-portraits to photographs of artists, friends and notable figures of the 20th-century cultural scene - lyrical still life photos, classic and stylised erotic nudes, as well as assemblages from his early career and intimate polaroids. Mapplethorpe’s oeuvre, presented in this exhibition - which is incisive, vast, provocative and immensely influential - made him one of the most important artists of the twentieth century.