It was only a matter of time before Richard Prince mined Instagram, a free and open source of everyone’s personal images, for material.
First presented at the Gagosian in New York last September, Prince’s blown-up screenshots of Instagram photos—to which he has added an enigmatic comment at the bottom (“No Cure, No Pay…🎎,” is one example)—are sometimes sourced from an account belonging to SuicideGirls, which features punk models and burlesque performers.
Prince’s image of Doe Deere, for example, pictured on the right, sold for $90,000 during the Frieze New York V.I.P. preview. Instead of threatening to sue the artist, The Guardian reports, SuicideGirls founder Selena Mooney (also known as Missy Suicide), has announced online that she is planning to also sell prints of the images Prince used for $90 each, with all proceeds going to the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Prince retweeted her post, which reads, “Do we have Mr. Prince’s permission to sell these prints? We have the same permission from him that he had from us. ;)”