James Franco Explains Why He Painted Pre-Existing Nudes of Seth Rogen
James Franco recently painted some racy nudes of Seth Rogen and as we surmised, they were paintings of pre-existing sketches from a Rogen fan and artist who also happens to be a bear.
The subculture, not the animal.
So why did Franco paint them in the first place?
The actor was on The Today Show when talk turned to his recent artwork. Franco admitted that the art was not original and did not belong to him, but he felt like it should.Just like he thought he was taking that nearly nude selfie for the fans.
"Some other artist took it upon himself to do these sketches of Seth in the nude," Franco explained. "Seth didn't pose for them. But this artist depicted Seth, and he wouldn't have gotten much attention for these sketches, except that he put Seth's face on it. And so I felt like, oh here he is appropriating Seth's personality and his persona for his art to get attention for his art."
"I thought, well, if anybody should paint Seth naked, it should be me, so I took his sketches and did paintings."