One big theme in Patty’s “Just Kids” has been gender identity. She herself first encounters the concept of gender identity when her mother requires that she put a shirt on because she is beginning to develop breasts. She was hurt by this, but as she grew up and moved to Manhattan, she seemed to become less defined by her gender, especially in her art. Robert, the focus of the book, had a much more complicated relationship with his sexuality. Having grown up in a religious household with a cold father figure, he had little freedom to express himself in a sexual way or to explore and question his sexuality. When he moved to Manhattan away from his family, he developed more personality wise, and part of that was his sexual/gender identity. Unlike Patty, he had reflected this in his work. His photographs are considered controversial even to this day, because of it’s homoerotic and BDSM themes. Not all of his photographs however are centered around these subjects.

In my English class, our professor has asked if photography was art, and if only staged photography was art. I was reminded of this discussion upon viewing Robert’s work, all of his photographs are deliberately staged, each shot is perfection in terms of light and composition. If someone happened to take a great shot by accident, is it still art?

In this auto-portrait, Mapplethorpe looks very feminine, he is wearing a women’s coat and makeup. I did not even immediately recognized it was him.

Here is one of the photos from his controversial X Portfolio. Photos like these have raised a national debate over what is considered obscene and what is art, and whether tax dollars should be spend on this kind of art and art in general.