You know, David Lachapelle, fine. Courtney Love, whatever. £37,250 at auction in London today, ridiculous and probably manipulated, but I can ignore it.
The thing that really kind of gets under my fingernails like a bamboo skewer about Lachappy's Pieta with Courtney Love, though, is the date.
If it had been shot in 1993 or so, and that was really Kurt, and really Frances Bean, we could dismiss it as transgressive kitsch.
But it was made in 2006, people. 2006.
This photo was not meant to exist in our space-time reality, and yet it does. In an edition of three, no less. And so now I fear for the future.
Feb 17, 2012, Lot 197: DAVID LACHAPELLE,
Pieta with Courtney Love, sold for £37,250 [phillipsdepury.com]
Never understimate the ability of rich assholes to part with their money. Sorry, couldn't think of a more elegant way to put it.