Australia may lay claim to inventing the word "selfie" but photographer, stylist and designer Maripol was taking her own self-portraits back in the '70s with her "faithful" Polaroid camera.

Her "Maripolaroids", as she calls them, also captured the vibrant underground culture of New York City through the decade that followed, which spawned the likes of Madonna, Debbie Harry, Grace Jones and artists Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat.

Photographer, stylist and fashion designer Maripol with reproductions of her 'Maripolaroids' at the Keith Haring & Jean-Michel Basquait exhibition at NGV International. Credit:Eddie Jim

Maripol's photos, which are on show at the NGV's summer blockbuster Keith Haring | Jean-Michel Basquiat: Crossing Lines, have an immediacy and authenticity to them. The Instagram of its day, the Polaroid camera pops out a hard-copy photograph which then self-develops before your eyes.

Instagram would later copy the camera's distinctive square format but back then, of course, there were no filters - other than the bright wash of the Polaroid's flash bulb.