By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3 cats
Director: James Crump
Country: united_states
Year: 2008
Running time: 77
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1003113/
Bruce says: “Robert Mapplethorpe achieved world-wide fame and notoriety in the 1980’s when his stunning black and white photographs became iconic and his reputation for being lewd, lurid and lascivious mushroomed. Little about Mapplethorpe having a partner is ever mentioned. BLACK AND WHITE + GRAY is an interesting look at Sam Wagstaff, the ‘man-behind-the-man.’ Wagstaff hailed from a wealthy New York society family and attended Yale. Because of his many connections he entered the art world as an insider. He was a curator and collector and both of these roles exerted great impact on how art at the time was viewed and valued. After a brief career as an advertising executive at Benton and Bowles, Wagstaff became a curator at Wadsworth Antheneum followed by a move to the Detroit Institute of Fine Art. While Wagstaff was extraordinarily influential and famous in art’s inner circles, little about him is remembered other than his relationship to Mapplethorpe.
“In contrast to Wagstaff’s life of privilege, Mapplethorpe grew up in a Catholic working class family in Floral Park, NY. He attended Pratt and began his career as a collage artist. When he met Wagstaff, he was struggling and unknown. Wagstaff with his impeccable eye helped Mapplethorpe find his métier, his niche. Twenty five years older than Mapplethorpe, Wagstaff had the money to fund a loft/studio for the young photographer. Mapplethorpe in turn helped Wagstaff amass one of the foremost photography collections of his time, one that the Getty paid $5 million to acquire in 1987.
“Wagstaff is described as tall, aristocratic and slender: a debutante’s dream. As a gay man in the fifties Wagstaff experienced the universal suppression and oppression of that time. He rarely talked about it because he claimed it was too painful living a life that was a lie, pretending to be what he was not. His and Mapplethorpe’s mutual attraction may initially have been based on their affinity for kinky, rough-and-tumble sex. That attraction evolved into an interesting meeting of two creative minds supporting one another to an amazing degree.
“There is a ton of information in BLACK AND WHITE + GRAY but there seems to be an equal portion missing. Leaving the theater the realization that you really did not get to know the subjects very well rapidly sets in. Patti Smith discusses her years of communal living with Wagstaff and Mapplethorpe as a ‘beautiful, uncomplicated relationship,’ however she gives only the slightest insight into their true characters. Other talking heads discuss the two men as though they were objects rather than people, their assessments obviously made from a distance. 3 cats
‘BLACK AND WHITE + GRAY screened at the 2007 Woodstock Film Festival”
Tony says: “I thought this was very informative. I( don’t know anything about these people but I’ve heard of some of them so it was good to hear some stories. Funny how people can hold on to things so long, even though it didn’t seem like too many people actually knew that much. Is that a normal size penis? I’ll bet the Getty Museum has some pretty awesome pictures. 3 cats”