Robert Mapplethorpe (1946-1989) - Thomas in a Circle, 1987

Vintage gelatin silver print applied on original cardboard
cm 60,3 x 50,3 (cm 48,7 x 48,8 picture) | 23.7 x 19.8 in. (19.2 x 19.2 in. picture)
Edition 7 of 10Numbered, signed and dated in black ink on the white inferior recto margin and titled, dated, numbered and signed in black ink with photographer's credit stamp on the cardboard versoFramed

PROVENANCE
Stripped Bare: Photographs from the Collection of Thomas Koerfer ,Christie's Paris, November 9th, 2017, Lot 15

LITERATURE
Richard Mashall et al., Robert Mapplethorpe, Whitney Museum of American Art, Bulfinch Press, New York, 1988, p. 170Mark Holborn (ed.), Mapplethorpe, Random House, New York, 1992, p. 96W.M. Hunt, The Unseen Eye: Photographs from the Unconscious, Aperture, New York, 2011, p. 132

The American photographer Robert Mapplethorpe quickly established himself as one of the greatest interpreters of the male nude, as this image amply demonstrates. The extreme refinement of the black and white print serves to emphasise the search for an original posture. Here the body is inscribed in a circle, creating a compositional harmony that seems to reproduce the classical Vitruvian Man in a contemporary key.