With Prince you did just one shot, but it certainly made its mark… How did that cover come about?
Before I met him, I was completely under Prince's spell. There was no one above him. Sure there'd been Talking Heads, Devo, and a few others… But Prince! He was doing pop, electro, funk, he sang like an angel, he could play everything, he had the look, he had Wendy and Lisa… I fell head over heels in love with Prince. He asked me to make a video for him. I spent a week in his company at the time of Lovesexy. We were in the studio in Minneapolis and he said we were leaving the next day for Los Angeles and suggested I do the album cover. We were supposed to talk and find ideas in the plane. But then we weren't together and so when we got to L.A. he invited me to come find and him at a club that night. And there he was with his Los Angeles entourage, Sheila E, Mike Tyson… As the night went on I began to get anxious, the studio was booked. Later he told me we'd talk over breakfast. Obviously I didn't sleep a wink. So I went to the essence of a choir boy: the Sistine Chapel. Prince's discourse is pretty apocalyptic, Sign O' The Times, 1999, and yet at the same time kind of tantric, that way he talks about spirituality and sexuality. I did a little drawing during the night, starting from the idea of a nude. In the morning he said, "It's perfect." That same night we chose just one Ekta which I took back to Paris with me. Then I scanned that photo and used the only machine that could retouch in Paris. It was my friend Kiki Picasso who had the demonstration model. Prince took a plane and we all found ourselves in the kitchen, the kids horsing around with his bodyguards. In the end Prince destroyed everything, and he said to me, "I think what you did with the flowers was best." The cover came out and got banned in quite a few States. It's a religious image par excellence.

A very interesting read. Thanks so much for sharing. It's nice to read it from Mondino's perspective. In his own words. And I can imagine it happening just like he said. Impressive, in many ways....

Wolfie87 said:

"In the end Prince destroyed everything" What is this line supposed to mean?

Destroyed some of the photo material? That's what crossed my mind, but it's nothing more than a guess.

And of course no effort to link to the original source.

.

https://i-d.vice.com/en_u...-his-spell

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Wolfie87 said:

"In the end Prince destroyed everything" What is this line supposed to mean?

.
All of the unused shots.

Thanks for this information.

A comment on this Housequake post says that it's a transcription of subtitles from a video interview. So, the comment describes a transcription of a translation, though perhaps noting all that here on my post is excessive.

The video is linked in the comment, but the link doesn't work for me.

https://www.facebook.com/housequake/photos/a.361699067247157/1115435581873498/?type=1&theater

See comment by Jean-Yves André (fourth comment down)

[Edited 5/21/20 8:39am]

Cool story.

Even though I totally get it and love the artful cover NOW...I thought the dude completely lost it when it was released back in 88. i remember being embarrassed buying it. What can I say, it was 1988, I was 18, and VERY insecure .

Always always always provide a link to the source. And give credit.

Post ONE paragraph and provide the link with it. Posting an entire article is copyright infringement when you don't have written permission from the source to post the article in its entirety.


Any threads created that do not include a link will get the



Thank you Bart who provided a link.

mattj said:

With Prince you did just one shot, but it certainly made its mark… How did that cover come about?

Before I met him, I was completely under Prince's spell. There was no one above him. Sure there'd been Talking Heads, Devo, and a few others… But Prince! He was doing pop, electro, funk, he sang like an angel, he could play everything, he had the look, he had Wendy and Lisa… I fell head over heels in love with Prince. He asked me to make a video for him. I spent a week in his company at the time of Lovesexy. We were in the studio in Minneapolis and he said we were leaving the next day for Los Angeles and suggested I do the album cover. We were supposed to talk and find ideas in the plane. But then we weren't together and so when we got to L.A. he invited me to come find and him at a club that night. And there he was with his Los Angeles entourage, Sheila E, Mike Tyson…

As the night went on I began to get anxious, the studio was booked. Later he told me we'd talk over breakfast. Obviously I didn't sleep a wink. So I went to the essence of a choir boy: the Sistine Chapel. Prince's discourse is pretty apocalyptic, Sign O' The Times, 1999, and yet at the same time kind of tantric, that way he talks about spirituality and sexuality. I did a little drawing during the night, starting from the idea of a nude. In the morning he said, "It's perfect."

That same night we chose just one Ekta which I took back to Paris with me. Then I scanned that photo and used the only machine that could retouch in Paris. It was my friend Kiki Picasso who had the demonstration model. Prince took a plane and we all found ourselves in the kitchen, the kids horsing around with his bodyguards. In the end Prince destroyed everything, and he said to me, "I think what you did with the flowers was best." The cover came out and got banned in quite a few States. It's a religious image par excellence.

this, thanks for posting. Getting banned made it even more rapturous!

Strange, when people here post in favor of censoring Prince, my standard sarcastic reply is - Should we paint clothes on the Sistine Chapel murals too? Never knowing the Lovesexy cover was inspired by one of those images.

poppys said:

mattj said:

With Prince you did just one shot, but it certainly made its mark… How did that cover come about?

Before I met him, I was completely under Prince's spell. There was no one above him. Sure there'd been Talking Heads, Devo, and a few others… But Prince! He was doing pop, electro, funk, he sang like an angel, he could play everything, he had the look, he had Wendy and Lisa… I fell head over heels in love with Prince. He asked me to make a video for him. I spent a week in his company at the time of Lovesexy. We were in the studio in Minneapolis and he said we were leaving the next day for Los Angeles and suggested I do the album cover. We were supposed to talk and find ideas in the plane. But then we weren't together and so when we got to L.A. he invited me to come find and him at a club that night. And there he was with his Los Angeles entourage, Sheila E, Mike Tyson…

As the night went on I began to get anxious, the studio was booked. Later he told me we'd talk over breakfast. Obviously I didn't sleep a wink. So I went to the essence of a choir boy: the Sistine Chapel. Prince's discourse is pretty apocalyptic, Sign O' The Times, 1999, and yet at the same time kind of tantric, that way he talks about spirituality and sexuality. I did a little drawing during the night, starting from the idea of a nude. In the morning he said, "It's perfect."

That same night we chose just one Ekta which I took back to Paris with me. Then I scanned that photo and used the only machine that could retouch in Paris. It was my friend Kiki Picasso who had the demonstration model. Prince took a plane and we all found ourselves in the kitchen, the kids horsing around with his bodyguards. In the end Prince destroyed everything, and he said to me, "I think what you did with the flowers was best." The cover came out and got banned in quite a few States. It's a religious image par excellence.

this, thanks for posting. Getting banned made it even more rapturous!

Strange, when people here post in favor of censoring Prince, my standard sarcastic reply is - Should we paint clothes on the Sistine Chapel murals too? Never knowing the Lovesexy cover was inspired by one of those images.

It wasn't banned in several states but several retailers either refused to stock it or kept it behind the checkstand.

The ONE mistake made with the Lovesexy cover is that he should have taken a cue from John Lennon and Yoko, who sold many more copies of Two Virgins than were expected. Why? Because of the plain brown wrapper. People (including me) bought it just for the curiosity. But unlike Prince's Lovesexy music, Two Virgins was terrible.

The plain brown wrapper would have insured it was stocked in all the stores.

Kares said:

Wolfie87 said:

"In the end Prince destroyed everything" What is this line supposed to mean?

.
All of the unused shots.

I think only the mock ups for the alternate covers with other shots were saved, the rest was indeed destroyed.

luv4u said:

Always always always provide a link to the source. And give credit.

Post ONE paragraph and provide the link with it. Posting an entire article is copyright infringement when you don't have written permission from the source to post the article in its entirety.


Any threads created that do not include a link will get the



Thank you Bart who provided a link.

Yeah, but dude could have done it without being a total dick. Just sayin'...

ThirdStrike said:

Yeah, but dude could have done it without being a total dick. Just sayin'...

.

Confusing the message with the shape of the message...

udo said:

ThirdStrike said:

Yeah, but dude could have done it without being a total dick. Just sayin'...

.

Confusing the message with the shape of the message...

...seems the message is shaped like a dick then...

ThirdStrike said:

udo said:

.

Confusing the message with the shape of the message...

...seems the message is shaped like a dick then...

.

If you see things that way, this tells more about you than about the message.

.

Did you know that on the Lovesexy cover only hints of dicks are visible?

Or perhaps non-meaty variants of genitalia?

udo said:

ThirdStrike said:

...seems the message is shaped like a dick then...

.

If you see things that way, this tells more about you than about the message.

.

Did you know that on the Lovesexy cover only hints of dicks are visible?

Or perhaps non-meaty variants of genitalia?

Wait...I was talking about Bart. Do you think I was talijng about the photog?

Wolfie87 said:

"In the end Prince destroyed everything" What is this line supposed to mean?

I think he's trying to say that all the work they did at Kiki Picasso's while Prince with them was thrown away, and he liked the original flower that Jean-Baptiste had done to begin with.

mattj said:

he was with his Los Angeles entourage, Sheila E, Mike Tyson…

Iron Mike?

lavendardrummachine said:

mattj said:

he was with his Los Angeles entourage, Sheila E, Mike Tyson…

Iron Mike?

That would be an interesting photo - Mike Tyson and Prince next to each other - the skinny mf with the high voice and Iron Mike ??????