Thursday, September 25, 2003
From Jack Fritscher's eBay auction listing
I was the bi-coastal lover of the notoriously gay Robert Mapplethorpe who photographed Arnold Schwarzenegger. (In a national scandal in 1989-1990, Senator Jesse Helms denounced Mapplethorpe on the floor of the US Senate and took away government funding of art, virtually destroying the National Endowment for the Arts.) . . .
The next very personal item (which was given directly to me by Mapplethorpe) is extremely rare, and, after all these years, probably one of a kind. It is an original Schwarzenegger-Mapplethorpe photo postcard, approximately 3x5, featuring a black-and-white photograph of Arnold titled: Robert Mapplethorpe “Torso” 1978.
Arnold’s 240 pounds appear in a 5-ounce posing brief artfully tinted a subdued red. (Do the math!)
The postcard is surrounded by a red border. (The photo was exhibited at the Smithsonian in 1978.) On the reverse side of this historical card from the wild “Titanic 1970s” is an invitation, handwritten in black ink by Robert Mapplethorpe, to a “Hot Dirty Man” sex party at 652 Hudson Street, with arrival “required before 11:30" when the doors closed. The postcard, signifying Arnold’s gay sex appeal, is in excellent condition. . . .
I am also including from my personal collection my VERY RARE AND VERY COLLECTIBLE FEBRUARY, 1977, ISSUE OF AFTER DARK MAGAZINE. I have carefully stored this 26-year-old treasure to keep it in excellent condition. The photo layout features 22 photographs (including the full-color cover of Arnold) selected by After Dark who combined the very exhibitionist photos for maximum sex appeal to its gay demographic.
Two color photos shot by George Butler are outstanding CANDID NUDE PORTRAITS in the frank style of the free-wheeling 1970s:
1) a color FULL-FRONTAL NUDE of Arnold Schwarzenegger and
2) a color NUDE BUTT-SHOT taken from Arnold’s left side.
The photo layout’s 22 photographs, some of them full page, include . . . , Arnold is reclined, like painter Ingres’ Grande Odalisque, toward the camera in what can only be reviewed in a randy gay magazine as “a delirious shoulder-and-pec-loaded crotch shot.”
Yet another gorgeous photo, formally posed by Arnold and formally composed by Pumping Iron’s George Butler, glorifies Arnold standing majestically outdoors (in the “archer” pose) with three young black adolescents sitting, I myself think, very Suddenly Last Summer at his feet; one reaches his hand up to the top of Arnold’s striated thigh. . . .
Note that the Congressional criticism of Mapplethorpe arose from the fact that he used federal tax dollars to photograph, among other things, a crucifix in a jar of urine.
See also: Bigwig Nazi father pulled army strings for Arnold.
and Schwarzenegger: 'I dreamed of being dictator' - LibertyThink unearths 1976 interview
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