English edition · Originally published by Matteo Zanetti in Tamago-Zine on October 18, 2026.
Axl Rose enters a gallery in Beverly Hills after dinner.
It is 1991, and he has in mind a song still being worked on, Locomotive, in which the image of an illusion bought and hung on a wall recurs. In an office he notices a painting that attracts him. He turns it over. On the back are the words: Use Your Illusion.
He recounted it himself on Rockline on November 27, 1991. For Axl it was a sign, and he bought the painting: by his account, the first of his life. Mark Kostabi, the artist, places the scene at the Hanson Gallery on Rodeo Drive.
Shortly afterward, Kostabi recounts, Rose's representative called him: the singer wanted the painting on the cover and that title for the new Guns N' Roses project. The work had not been commissioned by the band. It already existed, and it was Rose who saw a connection with his own music. Not an illustrator hired to translate a record into images, but an image that, by association, becomes the face of an album.
The subject was a detail from Raphael's School of Athens, isolated, enlarged and reworked with contemporary colors and contrasts. The work, in Kostabi's version, was collective: his brother Paul made a red print on a yellow background from a reproduction of the fresco, and a Kostabi World collaborator worked in oils on one of the figures.
Mark claimed the overall conception and signed it, as is the method of his studio, known for collective production under his supervision. The title, too, is attributed to Paul: according to Mark, it alluded to the illusions and exaggerations with which he cultivated his public image.
Use Your Illusion I and II were released together on September 17, 1991, with the same composition and two palettes: yellow and red for the first, blue and purple for the second. Kostabi maintains that the blue version was developed by Rose's entourage from his original. In both, the signature remains visible. For him it marked a departure from the gallery: the image was entering the everyday lives of millions of listeners.
In September 2022, in an interview, former manager Alan Niven stated that Rose paid Kostabi $75,000 for the use of the image on the covers and merchandise, without consulting him. In his view, it was an unnecessary expense: the detail from Raphael was in the public domain. Many articles have repeated the figure as fact. But all the sources lead back to Niven's words: no invoice, no bank transfer, no contract.
Kostabi replies that the figure is wrong and that the real price is covered by a confidentiality clause. He also disputes the premise: the public domain applies to the fresco, not necessarily to the new elements of his reworking. In a later intervention, Niven names then-manager Doug Goldstein as the source of the amount and adds that merchandising company Brockum had confirmed to him the possibility of using Raphael's images. That explains where the figure comes from, but it does not verify it or clarify the terms of the agreement.
From a legal standpoint, it is useful to distinguish at least three elements: the fresco, Kostabi's version and the physical canvas. The U.S. Copyright Office makes clear that a derivative work is protected only for new and original contributions; public-domain material remains freely usable. Not every variation in color or composition meets the threshold of originality, which in a dispute must be assessed case by case.
Buying a canvas, moreover, does not transfer copyright: ownership of the object and reproduction rights are separate things. Without the contract, it is impossible to know whether Rose paid for the painting, a license, an assignment or a combination of these things.
Kostabi's assertion that Rose could not have used the title without his consent also needs to be qualified. In the United States, titles and short expressions are not protected by copyright as such. Trademark rights or contractual obligations might exist, but they would have to be demonstrated. Saying that Rose paid for 'Raphael's rights' is wrong; saying, without knowing the agreement, that there was nothing to acquire is equally wrong.
Two opposing versions remain. Niven speaks of $75,000 spent unnecessarily; Kostabi denies the figure and defends the originality of his work. The contract, proof of payment and independent confirmation are missing. Presenting the affair as an established scam would be misleading.
The interest lies elsewhere: for the public, a cover inseparable from the music; for the artist, a recognizable transformation; for the manager, a possibly avoidable cost; for the law, an interweaving of forms of ownership that must be kept distinct.
And the opening scene remains, the best documented: Axl Rose in a gallery, standing before a painting titled Use Your Illusion, recognizing in it something he had just written. Raphael had conceived the scene, Kostabi and his studio had reinterpreted it, and Rose made it the symbol of two albums.
Anyone who has the album at home can see Mark's signature on the album cover. It is said that Kostabi has a reproduction of it hanging above his piano.
Complete English translation of the Italian original, preserving its structure and qualifications.
