Karley Sciortino, writer and star of Vice’s sex-ed series Slutever, doesn’t see the big deal with Richard Prince’s highly controversial New Portraits exhibition (her image appears in the series). Although it debuted at the Gagosian Gallery last year, it was New Portraits’ reappearance at Frieze Art Fair that sparked the recent wave of critical dialogue, but Sciortino isn’t perturbed. “I don’t really understand the uproar over it,” she said an interview with Business Insider. “Richard Prince is a hugely successful artist who’s made his career doing exactly what he’s doing now. Personally I feel like it’s an honour to be incorporated in a piece of his artwork.”
Anna Collins feels differently. The sister of Petra Collins also spoke with Business Insider, “I just think about how I’m a working student in school, I’m extremely broke, and here is a middle-aged white man making a huge profit off of my image. Kind of makes me sick. I could use that money for my tuition.” Collins highlights what has emerged as a core issue of New Portraits; less about Prince’s initial ‘theft’, and more about him being the sole profiteer of the work. It’s also troubling that Prince, by and large, chose images of young women.