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In the following pages I will be looking at the work of Robert Mapplethorpe, in particular various black and white flower photographs titled Lily 1977, Calla Lily 1984, Calla Lily 1986 and Calla Lily 1988. All of these particular images appeared in the Mapplethorpe exhibition “The Perfect Moment”, which caused enormous uproar due to the controversial imagery. Employing various methods of analysis such as psychoanalysis and semiotics I aim to reveal some of the underlying currents throughout his work. Although these images are not sexually graphic, they do allude to sex, in particular the male sexual organs. Mapplethorpe once stated that ‘my approach to photographing a flower is not much different than photographing a cock. Basically it’s the same thing’ (Celant 1993). This leads me to believe that Mapplethorpe’s social life and sexuality had an enormous influence on these non-sexually graphic images. In particular the context in which he presented them to the public was quite erotic itself. He placed sadomasochism imagery together with these beautiful sensual flower images, which provoked the correlation between the two types of imagery. The context of the exhibition in which these photograph