The work and vision of one of the world’s most revered photographers, Robert Mapplethorpe (1946-1989), will be shown in an Australian exclusive exhibition at the 2025 Ballarat International Foto Biennale.
This selection of Robert Mapplethorpe’s work has been curated by Edward Enninful OBE, Ghanaian-born British editor and stylist who was Editor in Chief of British Vogue and European editorial director for Conde Nast magazines.
For ENNINFUL x MAPPLETHORPE, Enninful’s selection of 46 photographs in pairs invites visitors to experience Mapplethorpe’s artworks with a fresh vision. Robert Mapplethorpe was a master photographer whose work created tension between light and dark, celebrity and underground, sacred and profane, ripple and form.
Vanessa Gerrans, CEO of the Ballarat International Foto Biennale, said this exquisite exhibition was a major coup for Australia’s largest photography festival. “To see these prolific works by Mapplethorpe presented in curated pairs by Enninful is a huge drawcard for the Biennale,” she said.
“This exhibition tells Mapplethorpe’s story as well as drawing attention to his creative statements of using shadow to mark the features of an individual in his bold, unapologetic and iconoclastic style.”
“We are honoured to be celebrating the work of Robert Mapplethorpe and working alongside Edward Enninful and the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation to bring this must-see exhibition to Australia for the Ballarat International Foto Biennale,” said Gerrans.
Mapplethorpe photographed people he knew and those on the rise in music, film, art and creative pursuits. In ENNINFUL x MAPPLETHORPE there are familiar faces:
- Isabella Rossellini in saturated black and white;
- Grace Jones painted by Keith Haring, standing alert and open in a headdress with conical jewellery on her chest;
- a young Richard Gere; a serious silhouette of Karl Lagerfeld with Dovanna in one of his Paris haute couture dresses; and
- a curious iconic photograph of Princess Margaret with Reinaldo Herrera on the beach in Mustique, tanned with a gin bottle close by.
Highlights of ENNINFUL x MAPPLETHORPE include a series of self-portraits taken by Mapplethorpe over a year and showing aspects of the parts of his character where he was self-confident: dressed like a bad boy redolent of James Dean or Marlon Brando, or wearing full makeup in a fur coat with his full painted lips front and centre.
Mapplethorpe’s now iconic photographs of rock n’ roll musician, artist and poet Patti Smith show their symbiotic relationship in a series of seminal photographs, including the androgynous image of Patti wearing a white shirt, slim tie and jacket, tossed over one shoulder, that appeared on the cover of her Horses album in 1975, 50 years ago.
This exhibition is presented with the cooperation of the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. “On behalf of the Board of Directors of the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, I express how pleased we are that Edward Enninful’s unique and visionary approach to Mapplethorpe will now be part of the distinguished Ballarat International Foto Biennale,” said Michael Ward Stout, President, Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation.
“This exhibition achieved enormous praise both from critics and attendees when it was first installed in Paris, at the Thaddaeus Ropac Gallery, in March of 2024. While Robert Mapplethorpe exhibitions have been presented in Sydney and Perth, we are particularly excited for his works to be presented at this important festival, showing the talent not only of the artist, but also the curator.”
ENNINFUL x MAPPLETHORPE will be on display at the Post Office Gallery, Ballarat and joins Campbell Addy on the line-up for the 11th edition of Australia’s largest and highly celebrated photography festival.
ENNINFUL x MAPPLETHORPE is exclusive in Australia to the Ballarat International Foto Biennale, 23 August – 19 October 2025. For more information, visit: www.ballaratfoto.org for details.
Images: Robert Mapplethorpe, Embrace, 1982. Copyright © Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. Used by permission. | Robert Mapplethorpe, Patti Smith, 1975. © Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation. Used by permission.