Patti Smith confesses she was “haunted” by Robert Mapplethorpe after his death
In a new, emotional interview, Patti Smith has revealed that she was “haunted” for some time by the ghost of her late friend and photographer, Robert Mapplethorpe.
In 2010, Smith published her memoir, Just Kids. In it, she wrote eloquently and nostalgically about her friendship with Mapplethorpe, who passed away from complications related to HIV/AIDS in 1989 at the age of 42.
Speaking on the CNN podcast All There Is with Anderson Cooper, Smith opened up about the loss of Mapplethorpe and discussed her spiritual connection with him that still persists today.
“Robert was such a part of my consciousness,” Smith shared. “I was seeing him everywhere. I dreamed of him constantly. I actually saw him like a hologram sitting in a chair while I was folding laundry.”
She continued, “That’s how much he was around. I didn’t know even what it was. I mean, it’s a form of grief, but it was also, I was like haunted, really. I couldn’t get him out of my sight line. I couldn’t get him of my mind.”
She also admitted of losing her best friend, “Robert was my first major, major loss. In the string of losses that I was about to go through, Robert was the first. He was only 42.”
Reflecting on her own life, Smith added, “When I think of myself, what I’ve accomplished since 42, my greatest accomplishments were really in my late 50s and 60s, as a writer at least. Robert, he had so much work, so many visions, so much to do, so much capability.”
She went on, “And what I mourn is like, I know what he wanted to do. I feel the pain of incompletion. I could imagine what he would have done.”
In light of her brother Todd’s passing, Smith mused upon what it means to grieve, sharing later on in the podcast, “I always say to people, grief does not mean crying and sobbing. That’s part of it. It could be wailing. I mean, I feel like I’ve done it all. But it’s not required.”
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