Michael Jackson Exclusive: See the Full Mural Featuring Lisa Marie Presley, Brooke Shields, Tatum O’Neal, Diana Ross
Brooke Shields, Lisa Marie Presley, Tatum O’Neal, Diana Ross, Marvin Gaye and the Jackson 5 are among the many celebrities featured in a mural included with the new Michael Jackson album, “Michael.”
I told you months ago that Jackson co-executor John McClain had commissioned the mural from artist Kadir Nelson. Originally it had included drawings of Jackson’s legal team and other miscellaneous participants in the Jackson saga. But now it’s just celebrities. Here’s the full mural for the first time, with Naomi Campbell, Janet Jackson, animals from Neverland, and even a little ad for Cirque du Soleil. There are also pictures of Berry Gordy, the Temptations, James Brown, Bubbles the Chimp, Liza Minnelli, and some Motown artists.
There are no portraits, however, of some key Jackson players: Debbie Rowe and Macaulay Culkin. Too bad. In 2005, their testimony helped save Michael from going to to jail. Also, no Liz Taylor or Marlon Brando.
For a mural that’s supposed to depict Jackson’s life, there is also no nod to his facial appearance post-2000–no white face. Click on the mural below for a bigger version.
click again for full picture
The old saying goes, while in the specialist’s head there are few scenarios, however , for a person with the learner’s mind, the entire world is open up.
That This Is It Picture Is Pure Perfection And Gives Me Much Joy. I’m Glad Oprah’s Big Head Isn’t On There. And I Wish A Few Others Weren’t On There, But Just Like The Album. Michael Wouldn’t have Done it That Way. So, I Have Little Respect For It. I PROMISE To L~O~V~E YOU FOREVER And A Day MICHAEL!!!
no matter what, Micheal always the BEST in my heart
MJ was not all-that sensitive about his vitiligo. Like a REAL MAN, he embraced it. It didn’t matter to him if he was black or white…heck, he was The KOP!
you guys have no shame.. making fun of michael’s skin disorder.. you know he was so sensitive about it.. and are you blind? his this is it picture is featured.
quinoti !!!!!!!!!! ne suprimmez pas ce message svp ty amo
It’s still garbage.
I love Michael so much. I don’t know why he’s gone. He was too young to pass away. I can’t stop crying until now. It hurts me like HELL…we want our real Michael Jackson back….now!!!!!
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Skin disorders are funny, aren’t they?
Almost as funny as vision loss…
Roger, the below interview explains why some of Michael’s friends are missing:
LOS ANGELES — Michael Jackson always knew how to stir the pot.
Almost 18 months after the artist’s death, fans have been speculating about the meaning
behind the painting reprinted on the cover ofMichael, Jackson’s posthumous album
out today. Jackson’s brother Jackie and the artist,Kadir Nelson, shared the story
behind the CD cover in an exclusive interview. In 2003, while recording the song
One More Chance, Jackson spotted a tribute painting ofMarvin Gaye’s life in Gaye’s studio.
The King of Pop immediately dialed Nelson. “He said, ‘I want one about me, but I want
it to be bigger,’ ” Nelson says. “He was always like that,” Jackie adds with a grin. “He wanted
things big.”But with Jackson’s legal troubles mounting at the time, “it fell through
the cracks,” Nelson says.
Two weeks after Jackson’s death in June 2009, the 9-by-41/2-foot painting
was recommissioned by his estate. In the painting, a portion of which is reproduced on the
CD jacket and will appear in promotional posters, trivia-savvy fans will spot a spaceship,
harking back to Jackson’s 1982 E.T. collaboration, and a floating golden gavel,
a nod to his courtroom drama. Jackson’s children, Paris, Prince and “Blanket,”
appear in the painting multiple times. In one scene, they sit alongside Michael, his hand
gripping a supersized water gun. Jackie says water guns were — and remain — a family
favorite. “They’ve always got water guns down (at Hayvenhurst, the Jackson family home
in Encino),” Jackie says, chuckling. “You have to be careful — they don’t care what you’re wearing.”
Nelson painted a host of Jackson’s famous friends into the piece, but audiences will
never see Elizabeth Taylor, Madonna, Oprah Winfrey and Debbie Rowe in reproductions.
Nelson and Jackie say those famous folks withheld copyright permission and will be left
out of released artwork. The most surprising refusal, Jackie says, was Taylor’s. “All the
things he’s done for Liz Taylor,” he murmurs, shaking his head. Who can be spotted in
posters? Friends such as Naomi Campbell, Tatum O’Neal and ex-wife Lisa Marie Presley.
There are 50 representations of the pop star in the supersized painting to commemorate
the years he lived. “I had to count every day to make sure I was right on,” says Nelson,
who included a crowned goldfish trapped inside a bubble in his final tally. “Michael
was so popular, he lived (like a fish) in a bubble.” For the dominant image
of Jackson in the painting, Nelson focused on the idea of royalty, putting
Michael in a suit of armor with his hand placed over his heart, “because
Michael put his heart into everything that he did,” Nelson says. Jackie gestures to a
tiny Volkswagen in the painting that reminds him of the early years. “The bus,”
he says, remembering how “freezing, going to Chicago in the cold and the snow,”
they were back then, “taking instruments out of that bus and slipping on the ice.”
Today, he says, the family is still healing from Michael’s death: “It’s something you never get over. “
The mural can’t include every single thing and/or person that Friedman considers important. It includes plenty as it is.
No white face because that skin disease was a problem for him like he told Oprah in 1993. It doesn’t need a place in the album biopic. It’s had its time in the spotlight. Michael Jackson was a proud black man all his life. Remember that.
For a mural that’s supposed to depict Jackson’s life, there is also no nod to his facial appearance post-2000–no white face
Really, Roger? Within three seconds of looking at the mural, I spotted two: one of the 2001 short film “You Rock My World”, and another of the March 2009 press conference to announce the “This Is It” residency in London…
And I’ll bet you there are more…
I think up in the top left above James Brown? is Kenny Ortega, and amazingly Bill Bray!
And it the very top left im sure thats John Branca two over from Teddy Riley.
Wow i could analyse this for hours!
Over on the right theres a small part of his face from “You Rock My World” video (2001) and the “This Is It” press conference (2009).
I agree that the estate has been rather limited in its exposure of white Michael. The first time I saw a white Michael was at the end of the Hold My Hand video.
Amazingly, Joe Jackson in inside a belt! Is this referencing his tendency to beat the kids with a belt?!
Yes it does have MJ post 2000..its got him in “this is it” and “rock my world”!
“For a mural that’s supposed to depict Jackson’s life, there is also no nod to his facial appearance post-2000–no white face.”
There is an image of him from the This Is It press conference.
I’d rather see an accurate one — like with Jordy, Gavin, Mac, Corey and all the other kids he messed with. He was a sicko, but he didn’t get away with it entirely.
It’s absurd not to include a recent picture of Michael Jackson. It’s part of who he was. He looked good in the This Is It movie. I want to remember him like that. Leaving it out is leaving out the essential Michael. His vitiligo was nothing to be ashamed of, after all. The idea behind this mural sucks.
HA… no, no Debbie Rowe would be included in a mural for Michael Jackson, everybody is informed of what that relationship was all about and how Debbie inserted herself into the marriage between Michael and his wife.