Remembering Michael Ward Stout Lawyer Who Ran Mapplethorpe’s Foundation

By Richard Sandomir

Michael Ward Stout, a prominent art-world lawyer who fought counterfeits of the Spanish Surrealist Salvador Dalí and ran the foundation of the photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, died on Oct. 16 at his home in Carmel, N.Y. He was 83.

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In 1988, a year before Mr. Mapplethorpe’s death at 42, Mr. Stout helped him start his foundation. Under Mr. Stout’s leadership ever since, the organization has protected and licensed the photographer’s work and, among its many projects and grants, established the Robert Mapplethorpe Gallery at the Guggenheim Museum and supported medical facilities associated with AIDS research.

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Over the past two decades, Mr. Stout agreed — with the foundation board’s input — to exhibitions at European galleries owned by Thaddaeus Ropac that have been guest-curated by a group of diverse artists, including the filmmaker Sofia Coppola, the actress Isabelle Huppert, the stage director Robert Wilson and Edward Enninful, the former editor of British Vogue.

“Michael was a passionate and tough negotiator who was always very eager to do what was in the best interest of Mapplethorpe,” Mr. Ropac said in an interview, adding, “He had the trust of artists because he had an honesty, a clearness and passion that was astounding.”