Friday, August 16, 2019

Mapplethorpe at the Corcoran


The Corcoran Gallery of Art, which is not really the Corcoran any more, has mounted a show, "6.13.89" about the cancellation of the retrospective Robert Mapplethorpe: the Perfect Moment. ( In case you don't know, the Corcoran imploded several years ago and is now owned by George Washington University. )   

The exhibit is basically flat glass cases filled with documents that tell the story of the event. 
Here is the contract for the exhibit; here is the exhibition plan; here are some newspaper articles about the show in New York.  Here are letters of people complaining about the content of the exhibit.  Here are newspaper articles in which Jesse Helms rails against the NEA for funding obscene art.  Here is the press release saying the Corcoran will be backing out of the exhibit. 

Here is  the backlash.  

Here are internal memos from within the Gallery.  Here are membership forms covered with complaints, protests and cancellations.  Here are letters from artists  refusing to show their work at the Corcoran.  

It is in an interesting story, but I can't help but think that in the general emptying out of the Corcoran, someone opened a file cabinet and said, "Look at all this stuff about the Maplethorpe exhibit, this could be a show."  And so it is.

I think the saddest document is a letter from the lawyer of David Lloyd Kreeger, a longtime supporter of the Corcoran.  He has added a codicil to Kreeger's Will rescinding previously pledged gifts to the Corcoran.  

It's really the beginning of the end for the Corcoran, it would take about two more decades, but they lost credibility, they lost financial support and they mismanaged the rest of it. 

The whole thing comes across more like a wake than an exhibit.



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