{"id":345929,"date":"2026-03-18T17:38:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T17:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/345929\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T17:38:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T17:38:08","slug":"prince-laughed-like-a-kid-as-i-painted-free-on-his-stomach-steve-parkes-best-photograph-art-and-design","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/345929\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Prince laughed like a kid as I painted \u201cFree\u201d on his stomach\u2019: Steve Parke\u2019s best photograph | Art and design"},"content":{"rendered":"

I grew up loving Prince\u2019s music and remember thinking: \u201cI\u2019m gonna work for that guy one day.\u201d Through high school and college I photographed local bands. I\u2019d say I worked for a newspaper but I didn\u2019t tell them it was the high-school newspaper, so they\u2019d give me passes to U2 or Boy George. Once, when I went to photograph Lionel Richie, Sheila E was supporting, who I knew had a Prince<\/a> connection. I ended up talking to her guitar-player and told him I was a photographer and artist. He asked me to draw something, so I did a quick portrait of him on a napkin and he said we should stay in touch.<\/p>\n

Around the Sign o\u2019 the Times album he called to say he was joining Prince\u2019s band, and said: \u201cI\u2019m gonna take you with me.\u201d He showed Prince some of my artwork, which he apparently liked. I was asked to paint a stage for him \u2013 that was the first job I did, and one day he asked: \u201cHave you ever taken photos?\u201d I was in the right place at the right time. I got a digital camera and became in-house art director at Paisley Park, taking photos from 1988 until 1996.<\/p>\n

I had a different experience with Prince to most. When I first met him, nobody told me, \u201cDon\u2019t look him in the eyes\u201d or anything like that. I was 25 and tried to be my normal self, but professional, which suited the way we worked. He\u2019d say: \u201cI\u2019ve got an idea, grab your camera.\u201d Sometimes he\u2019d ask me to delete a photo \u2013 it might have blurred, or the light hadn\u2019t been good \u2013 but he was very lucky to be so photogenic. There were shots where he came in with no makeup, and he had a different look, but he still looked great. I\u2019d say 98% of the time he looked incredible.<\/p>\n

double quotation markHe used to ask: ‘Why do people think I’ve had a nose job?’<\/p>\n

This shot was for Notorious magazine, one of the few times that somebody from outside hired me. It was for their end-of-year cover and their art director wanted his stomach to read \u201c1999\u201d. Prince was not having that. He wanted to do something new. It was during the period he was talking about his freedom from record labels, and he suggested the word \u201cFree\u201d. We set up at Paisley Park before 8am, which was unusually early. The art director saw the purple backdrop and one movie light and went: \u201cIs this how you wanna shoot?\u201d I told him it was how we worked. He said: \u201cIf I could suggest something, would it be OK?\u201d He came back with a shower curtain and hung it in front to give diffusion.<\/p>\n

When it came to the slogan Prince told the guy mixing the gold paint: \u201cSteve will do it.\u201d I was like: \u201cWhat?\u201d The next thing I knew I was writing \u201cFree\u201d on Prince\u2019s stomach with my fingers. It was cold, so he started laughing like a kid; I was thinking \u201cI hope the paint doesn\u2019t run because I\u2019ve got to clean my fingers off and start shooting.\u201d Prince\u2019s arms are outstretched because he knew that would draw more attention to the word.<\/p>\n

I was slightly taller so always had a great angle to shoot him from. He\u2019d drop his chin a bit and look up with those eyes. He used to ask: \u201cWhy do people think I\u2019ve had a nose job?\u201d I told him that was because when he was younger people would shoot him straight to the nose whereas the way I did it made him look more angular, so people thought he\u2019d had work done. The model in the shot is Desray Junca, who\u2019d been in the video for The Greatest Romance Ever Sold. He wanted a foil for the shoot: someone to give him options. The gold on her fingers makes it look as if she\u2019s been doing the painting. Nobody wanted to see me sitting there like that.<\/p>\n

Photograph: Britt Olsen-EckerSteve Parke\u2019s CV<\/p>\n

Born: Arizona, 1963
High point: Being given the opportunity by Prince, who was masterful in his own creativity and artistry.
Top tip: Trust your eye, because what you see leads to your style and your perception.<\/p>\n

Steve Parke\u2019s Prince books Vol 1: Black White Color and a two-volume special edition including Vol 2: Everything Else will be published by ACC Art Books<\/a> on 14 April.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I grew up loving Prince\u2019s music and remember thinking: \u201cI\u2019m gonna work for that guy one day.\u201d Through…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":345930,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[458,146,85,46],"class_list":["post-345929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345929","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=345929"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345929\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/345930"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=345929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=345929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=345929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}