shashasha

“Richard Prince 1234”, created by French artist and publisher Sebastien Girard, constitutes a brilliant reappropriation of reappropriated art. Between 2015 and 2017, the American artist Richard Prince operated an Instagram account (named “richardprince1234”) where he posted images reappropriated from other users each day. The images were only online for a few hours before being deleted again, but Girard – who likens the experiment to experiencing “a free concert played by Richard Prince himself” – was able to save each of the 2664 images posted to the account in two years.
The publication “Richard Prince 1234” constitutes the entirety of these images, collected in a 12-book set that features more than 560 pages. Ephemeral images saved forever on printed paper; reappropriated art reappropriated as art. Each book is the same size as a 12 inch vinyl record and comes housed in a vinyl-typical plastic sheet, heightening Girard’s vision of a bootleg record of a “historical concert.”

“Back in 2015 the Richard Prince 1234 Instagram account was a new daily dope. Richard Prince had just shown his “New Portraits series” at Gagosian New-York and started his new account @richardprince1234 on Instagram. As its content was ephemeral, I was missing all of his posts, so I got this idea of setting up some automatic recordings. Two years passed away then the account shut down. I suddenly realized I had recorded a historical concert, a ‘free concert’ played by Richard Prince himself. Time has come for an analog conversion and restitution of these 2 years of recordings: 2664 posts gathered into 12 chronological books of 48 pages, each one housed in a record sleeve. These are the Richard Prince 1234 / Instagram recordings.”
― Sebastien Girard