Mapplethorpe Show Opens in Boston : Art: The exhibit has stirred a national debate over federal funding of work that is deemed offensive.

BOSTON —  Dozens of supporters and a handful of protesters greeted patrons arriving today for the opening of an exhibit of Robert Mapplethorpe photographs that incensed Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) and got a museum director arrested in Cincinnati.

The crowd of about 150 people, largely made up of those supporting the show, was orderly, and no incidents were reported.

An estimated 200 visitors were lined up outside less than an hour after the museum opened its doors, said Denise Spencer, a marketing assistant at the Institute for Contemporary Art, which is showing the exhibit. The small museum is allowing just 75 people at a time to view the exhibit.

Meanwhile, a public television station that had broadcast the most sexually explicit, homoerotic photographs from the so-called “X Portfolio” on its newscast Tuesday night said this morning that it got about 100 calls in reaction to the newscast, most of them supportive.

Producers of WGBH’s 10 p.m. newscast said they aired the “X Portfolio” pictures Tuesday to let viewers decide for themselves how they feel about them.

“The coverage thus far never shows you this. All you get is what is in the mind of the writer. And we want our coverage to let the viewer decide, with both sides presented,” said John VanScoyoc, the station’s managing editor.

The photos have stirred a national debate over federal funding of work deemed offensive. The station, which like other public TV outlets receives federal funding, devoted 24 minutes of the half-hour newscast to the exhibit and the outcry over its explicit sexual images.

Despite efforts by protesters to have the photos banned, support for the show has been strong in Boston, once known as a city of bluenoses for banning books and movies.

A Mapplethorpe supporter was arrested Tuesday after disrupting the news conference of a coalition opposed to the showing. Artists and playwrights gave speeches in support of the exhibit, and marches and rallies were planned for today.

David Ross, director of the art institute, said he was proud to have the show of 124 photographs taken by Mapplethorpe from 1969 until shortly before he died of AIDS last year in Boston at age 42.