Sam Wagstaff and Anne MacDonald, NYC, Early 1970s
Gallery 98 has recently acquired a collection of letters, gallery cards and books from the estate of Anne MacDonald (1942 – 2018), an art patron who founded San Francisco Artspace and the magazine Shift. All of the items connect to Sam Wagstaff, a charismatic collector of photography, and to his partner, photographer Robert Mapplethorpe. Objects from this collection (along with a few from our inventory) are now featured in the online exhibition Letters and Ephemera: Anne MacDonald, Sam Wagstaff, Robert Mapplethorpe.
Anne McDonald first met Sam Wagstaff in the early 1970s when she was on the Board of Trustees at the Detroit Institute of Art where he was a curator. Wagstaff became MacDonald’s mentor, the person who inspired her to devote much of her life (and money) to supporting the most advanced contemporary art. In the letters that he wrote to her, Wagstaff talks about his passion for photography, his pride in the success of his partner Mapplethorpe, and also makes suggestions of art that might interest MacDonald.
Anne MacDonald got to know Mapplethorpe through Wagstaff, and her collection included a large amount of Mapplethorpe ephemera, such as a rare signed card for Censored, his controversial 1978 San Francisco exhibition. She also owned a signed edition of Arthur Rimbaud’s A Season in Hell, published by the Limited Editions Club that featured eight photogravures by Mapplethorpe.
Both Wagstaff and Mapplethorpe died of AIDS. Their symbiotic relationship was the subject of James Crump’s film Black White + Grey (2007), as well as Philip Gefter’s book Wagstaff: Before and After Mapplethorpe (2014). Gallery 98 wants to sell the collection of Wagstaff letters as a single lot; the Mapplethorpe items are being sold individually.
Letters from Sam Wagstaff to Anne MacDonald
Left: “Now that he’s hit the big time and has a real business going, he’s finding that one is just poorer at a richer level, with a staff (already yet) working for him 5 days a week. Time to be an artist rather than a factory manager is hard to find. Success might ruin Robert financially but it sure will never spoil him.”
Sam Wagstaff, letter to Anne MacDonald, January 6, 1982.
Right: “Don’t breathe a word to a soul (honest), but I might sell out and then I’d have the tax advantage of giving a little cash present to the museum in his (my step-father) name. It would be nice — like $100,000, if you think that would help your social position in town. Don’t tell Henry, but if this thing comes off I guess I could swing it. Of course, you know we could make the gift contingent on or for the purpose of purchase of many, many Mapplethorpes, something galling like that for Van.” (A reference to Van Deren Coke, the curator at the San Fransisco MoMA)
Sam Wagstaff, letter to Anne MacDonald, hinting at the possibility of selling his collection and making a donation to San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, February 7, 1984.
From a collection of eight handwritten and signed letters and four handwritten and signed postcards from Sam Wagstaff to Anne MacDonald, 1971 – 1986.
Available — Price on Request
Signed Edition of Arthur Rimbaud’s A Season in Hell, with Photogravures by Robert Mapplethorpe, 1986
Available — Price on Request
