Ever
since I finished ‘Just Kids’ I feel like Patti Smith has been with me, or at
least I’m seeing her everywhere. So even
though Patti is this incredible icon in ‘Just Kids’ I felt wrapped in a mutual
love story, lost in an almost mythic creative world where there was still
magic.
Patti
kept her promise to Robert Mapplethorpe and wrote their story, or at least a
few of them, I can imagine it was hard to narrow it down. But in this sample we
are painted with an entity not of Patti and Robert as single people but as a
partnership. This partnership grew as they evolved and in this beautiful
support they nurtured each other through struggles and choices that paved the
way to turn their passions into their legacies.
Interestingly
the feel that the rest of Patti’s life is somewhere else is incredible. This focus on Robert is beautiful
with the continuous inkling that this is for ‘you’. Yes Patti and Robert paths skew
but ‘Just Kids’ is their path, it folded over their own and fed and inspired
them.
The
romantic community where Patti tells the majority of their story is not always
idyllic but abundant in opportunity and made me never want to return to my own
reality. Where money came as a means to
get by and not the worth connoted with it
‘Just Kids’ immerses you in a fluent path of creation, of ideas, reading, writing, drawing and photography. In this beautiful
world we as readers are filled with a touch of every joy that Robert brought
Patti, and although we may want to sit in the halls of the Chelsea and read with her or
intently listen to a description of an exhibit only one of them could see we
cannot but we are blessed with this insight.
As
I found myself nostalgic for a time I was not present for I realised what a
magic moment Patti and Robert were a
part of, a time of talent and urgency of expression that online presence would
sweep over now. I understand the hilarity that I am writing this with the
intention of posting it online at some point, but meetings destined to fate and
a space to express without instant response are gone which is part of what
possibly makes ‘Just Kids’ so romantic.
With
Robert and Patti engaged in shared
experiences and pushing their own boundaries as well as creative boundaries the
world had yet to witness the book alights this ray of hope, of inspiration in
pure connection. There are moments in ‘Just Kids’ that seem surreal now but
form a cultural connection to us the reader, names, pieces and songs that are
now iconic were just finding their feet. These icons pass through in stunning descriptions that keep you wrapped
in Smith’s recollections.
As
all the pieces form together into elegy to
Robert you cannot help but see them come together to fit the two of them. They found themselves in their equal and in
this pure and beautiful relationship they became in all art forms storytellers,
artist and muse to one and other.
Get it here: Just Kids
Get it here: Just Kids
