Almodovar's Gaze: Robert Mapplethorpe

It is a stunning selection of images from Robert Mapplethorpe, as selected by renowned film director Pedro Almodovar. Robert Mapplethorpe and Pedro Almodovar first met in Madrid in 1984, during the photographer's first Madrid-based exhibition at the Fernando Vijande Gallery. At the time, Mapplethorpe was already an accomplished artist, with solo exhibitions in New York and London to his name, whilst Almodovar was a highly regarded underground filmmaker. This superbly illustrated volume brings together a collection of 31 Mapplethorpe images spanning 1976 to 1989, as selected by Almodovar himself for an exhibition at the Galeria Elvira Gonzalez in 2011. Almodovar's gaze has focused primarily on the human body and the geometry of the space surrounding it. Like Mapplethorpe himself, the film director views flower compositions, nudes and still life as the ultimate expression of the concept of beauty.