Brian Cross' pversized silver gelatin print of Ol' Dirty Bastard, shot for the cover of Rap Pages, ca. 1995
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ODB's Janet Jackson Tribute is Hitting Sotheby's

ODB's Janet Jackson Tribute is Hitting Sotheby's

Published Sun, March 27, 2022 at 2:55 PM EDT

One of the most iconic Hip-Hop photographs of all-time can be yours for less than $10,000. The image in question, of ODB, was shot by photographer Brian "B+" Cross for the 1995 cover of Rap Pages with the tagline: Ol' Dirty: keepin' it raw. The image itself is an homage to Janet Jackson's 1993 Rolling Stone cover where the pop star was depicted topless with an unknown man's covering her breasts.

Nearly two years later, while in a meeting with Cross, who was the photo editor for Rap Pages at the time, editor Gabe Alvarez posed the question: "what if those hands on Janet's breasts were Ol' Dirty's hands?"

As Cross recalls, "Thanks to the courage of our editor, Sheena Lester, we flew to New York and ended up with a thirty minute session with ODB. The model was a little nervous I think and requested a closed set...when push came to shove ODB became nervous, too. In all, the session lasted a very short time: two rolls of the Janet tribute and two rolls of solo portraits and ODB was gone. Weeks later, bootleg t-shirts of the Rap Pages cover were being sold on 125th Street in Harlem and we knew something impactful had happened."

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