PATTI SMITH
JUST KIDS
NOVEMBER 2, 2010
Just Kids is an intelligent book that cascades through Patti Smith’s youth into her young adult life and comes full circle back to the man who contributed to the woman we know and love today.
When Robert Mapplethorpe stepped into Smith’s life, her world began to change as he guided her in directions she would have never gone without him. She may have ended up where she is today, but the journey would have been altered in so many ways.
She was alone and without money as when her path crossed Robert’s. She had learned how to survive on the streets of New York without a roof over her head, a job, or money to buy food.
Smith is impressive when she has to choose between taking jobs to get a pay check or refusing and leaving employment. Mapplethorpe would take assignments that sometimes encouraged his artistic side, but he would often leave this work because he was unable to fulfill his internal need to be an artist. This would force Patti into keeping a job she did not like but eventually move on.
The connection the two of them shared often was more powerful than the dollars they needed to survive. Their psyche seems to be on a parallel path with their destination within arm’s length. Many crossroads played a part in forging the path of their intention to see their artistic dreams come to fruition.
The Chelsea Hotel was the environment that they both needed in order to encourage their creativity. The group of people that encompasses their lives from this point forward embraced their creativity. Patti met the people who she grew up adoring, whether it was for the music they made or the words/lyrics they wrote. Many in this crowd lost their lives and sent Patti into a mental turmoil, leaving her stranded in the memories they had given her.
By the time Smith’s future in the music industry took off, her and Mapplethorpe had begun to twist and turn down different roads. Although both led very distinct artistic lives, avenues they choose for their success came in different genres. Patti built her work around her music with a strong backdrop in art. Robert fashioned a life that could only engulf the photography that he slowly indulged.
Patti bought him his first camera that accompanied each baby step he took in letting the camera materialize what his eyes viewed as art. His visual imaging developed into erotic aphrodisiac excesses that were often criticized. Robert was never swayed from what he conceived as art and framed each piece with pride.
As their lives drift in different directions with Patti on the road all over the world, and Robert meeting Sam wag staff and pursuing his art as he viewed it as powerful visual openness to the human body, the book ends with Patti going back and being the companion she had always been for Robert. The connection was so strong that she admits when the phone call came she knew before picking up the phone what words she would hear from the other end.
RUSTY
11/2/10