During the mid-seventies Fleetwood Mac songwriter and vocalist began taking a series of selfies at home and in hotel rooms while tour and armed with her Polaroid camera.

The images had been locked away, never to see the day of light… that was until Nicks began reminiscing about times gone by during the recording of her solo album 24 Karat Gold – Songs From the Vault.

“I wanted to learn how to become a photographer,” the artist explained in a statement issued to New York City’s Morrison Hotel Gallery, a location which exhibited this intimate glimpse inside Nicks’ private life. “And since I don’t sleep at night, I started thinking, who am I going to ask to stay up all night and then do a show the next night?”

At the time of taking these self-portrait images Nicks was at the height of her fame, her distinctive voice, mystical stage persona and poetic, symbolic lyrics knew no bounds and she sold out venues around the globe. “I was doing [photogaphy] forever,” Nicks added, “and I didn’t stop until Polaroids were almost impossible to use because they all eventually broke down and we couldn’t find film anywhere.”

The gallery was gifted the rare images by Nicks, a now double Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and it came as an opportunity too good to miss: “Stevie Nicks offers a deeply intimate and revealing side to herself in this exhibition,” Morrison Hotel Gallery co-owner and founder Peter Blachley explained in a statement.

“Her choice of set and colour combined with a fascinating creative imagination documents a very special time in the history of music. These beautiful photographs –- totally honest and authentic — exquisitely capture the artist during her ascendancy to the top of the rock and roll world.”

“Some people don’t sleep at night – I am one of those people. These pictures were taken long after everyone had gone to bed – I would begin after midnight and go until 4 or 5 in the morning. I stopped at sunrise – like a vampire…



“I never really thought anyone would ever see these pictures, they went into shoeboxes, where they remained. I did everything – I was the stylist, the makeup artist, the furniture mover, the lighting director. It was my joy – I was the model.”—Stevie Nicks.

(All images via Morrison Hotel Gallery)