Made in New York City and Sausalito in 1977-78 and published in 1978, Robert Mapplethorpe's X Portfolio examines gay male sadomasochistic sexuality through 13 black-and-white photographs. Created during his move from Polaroids and collage to medium-format photography, the suite engages S&M subcultures through staged rather than straightforward documentary images. It raises questions about sexuality, spectatorship, formal control, and the art-pornography boundary.
Mapplethorpe called X "sex pictures" and paired it conceptually with Y Portfolio, devoted to flowers, and Z Portfolio, comprising nude portraits of Black men. Across these subjects, he sought forms that could register like sculpture. In X, controlled presentation and explicit content remain in tension, supporting formalist, devotional, queer-cultural, and anti-pornographic readings.
Near-square frames alternate environmental scenes with close crops of heads, torsos, hands, equipment, and partial bodies. Sitters are often masked or faceless. Worn Sausalito interiors contrast with plain grounds and drapery in New York images, while lighting ranges from diffuse tonal modeling to hard shadows and reflective backlighting. The sequence moves from a shaved head through kneeling and bound figures, fragments, and objects, ending with Mapplethorpe bent forward in leather beside a coiled whip. The resulting mood is controlled and concentrated, without a fixed narrative.
Using a medium-format camera, Mapplethorpe photographed scenes largely staged with participants already familiar with the practices, allowing close control of pose and setting. The negatives were printed in 1978 as selenium-toned, archivally processed gelatin-silver prints mounted on pure rag board. Jointly published by Harry Lunn, Robert Miller Gallery, and Robert Self, the edition comprised 25 numbered copies and six artist's proofs.
The complete suite appeared at LAICA's Bondage and Discipline in August 1978. Its broader public history developed through the 1988-90 retrospective The Perfect Moment. The controversy intensified with the Corcoran Gallery’s cancellation of The Perfect Moment in 1989 and the 1990 Cincinnati obscenity trial, in which the Contemporary Arts Center and its director, Dennis Barrie, were prosecuted for exhibiting several of Mapplethorpe’s photographs and ultimately acquitted. Together, these events placed his work at the center of national debates over censorship, sexuality, artistic freedom, and public arts funding. Later exhibitions reunited X, Y, and Z, notably in LACMA's Robert Mapplethorpe: XYZ in 2012-13 and the Getty/LACMA retrospective The Perfect Medium in 2016, following the museums' 2011 joint acquisition of the Mapplethorpe Archive.
