![]() ![]() Members of the religious right, especially, criticized academics and artists for what they regarded as their indecent, subversive and blasphemous works. The issues of censorship and artistic freedom that the show raised occupied the forefront of the debates between conservatives and liberals during the Ronald Reagan era and in its aftermath. ![]() In June 1989, after the cancellation of the exhibition by the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., two and a half weeks before it was to open there, The Perfect Moment unexpectedly provoked national controversy and ICA became a key player in the congressional debate over what public funds should and should not fund. Again, it generated no unfavorable public or critical attention. The Perfect Moment traveled to the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. Despite the controversial character of some of the photographs, critical response was enthusiastic and attendance was robust throughout the show's Philadelphia run (from December 1988 through January 1989). The traveling exhibition had been scheduled to appear at five other museums in various regions of the country during the next year and a half. The Perfect Moment covered all aspects of the photographer's career from the late 1960s to 1988. ![]() On tour, in the summer of 1989, the exhibition became the centerpiece of a controversy concerning federal funding of the arts and censorship. The exhibition, organized by Janet Kardon of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in Philadelphia, opened in the winter of 1988 just months before Mapplethorpe's death from AIDS complications on March 9, 1989. The show spanned twenty-five years of his career, featuring celebrity portraits, self-portraits, interracial figure studies, floral still lifes, homoerotic images, and collages. The Perfect Moment was the most comprehensive retrospective of works by New York photographer Robert Mapplethorpe. Retrospective of works by American photographer Robert Mapplethorpe ![]()
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