"Ken Moody & Robert Sherman, 1983" Print by Robert Mapplethorpe — Signed by Robert Sherman

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Description

One of Robert Mapplethorpe's most recognized images: Ken Moody and Robert Sherman, photographed in profile in 1983 — two bald … Read more One of Robert Mapplethorpe's most recognized images: Ken Moody and Robert Sherman, photographed in profile in 1983 — two bald heads, bare shoulders, a Black man behind and a white man in front, an image of calm intimacy that became the cover of Mapplethorpe's 1986 book Black Book and one of the defining photographs of his career.

This is a vintage sheet-fed gravure of that image, printed in Japan in the early 1980s. Gravure gives the photograph its rich, deep blacks and soft tonal range — closer in feel to an etching than to a modern photographic reprint.

What makes this example unlike any other we have seen: it is signed and inscribed on the back by one of the men in the photograph. In black ink across the verso, Robert Sherman wrote, 36 years after the sitting:

"Robert Sherman here / 36 years later / at least according to my / L.S.D. soaked memory! / 10/31/19"

To be clear, because buyers ask: the print is NOT signed by Mapplethorpe or stamped by his Estate. It is signed by the subject — which, for this particular image, is its own kind of provenance, and the reason we have kept it as a centerpiece listing.

Details:
- Artist: Robert Mapplethorpe (1946–1989)
- Title: Ken Moody & Robert Sherman, 1983 (published in Black Book, 1986)
- Medium: Sheet-fed gravure (intaglio), vintage print, printed in Japan, early 1980s
- Image size: approx. 10 × 10 inches (see dimension photo), mounted on board
- Signature: inscribed and signed on the verso by Robert Sherman, dated 10/31/19
- Certificate of authenticity included (shown in the photos)
- Condition: excellent, archival condition
- Unframed

Moody, a model and photographer's assistant, and Sherman, an artist and therapist, first met in New York in 1983, the year of this sitting. Mapplethorpe photographed them as part of his exploration of Black and white bodies together — work that remains at the center of his legacy. See less