Bins to Gold

Sophia Kearns opens the cover on the Australian artifact that is Michael In Pictures

Richard Simpkin shrugged off his beige coat as he sat down across from me, a Boston Red Sox cap pulled low over his brow and Michael in Pictures tucked under his arm like a skater with his favourite deck—scuffed, treasured, never far from reach. Into a cozy café in Bondi Junction, he moved a little slowly, careful on his feet, a quiet concession to the diabetes he has lived with for a lifetime. But there was nothing slow about his spirit. Within minutes, he was flicking through photos on his phone, grinning shots with Tony Hawk and recent airport candids with Amyl and the Sniffers.

Richard placed Michael in Pictures gently on the table, nudging it just out of reach of his coffee cup, careful not to crease the slipcover. The book is big—almost too big for the café table—and sits between us like a quiet third guest, its presence so tied to Richard's stories that it starts to feel like chiming in, offering proof and memory.

"I made the book I wanted as a fan and a collector," Richard says, tapping the cover lightly. "It's my own collection."

In 1989, Richard spent eight hours outside the Sebel Townhouse waiting for Michael Hutchence to sign another autograph, a decision that would quietly rewrite the shape of his life. "Something just made me stay for a better autograph," he says simply. "My life was obviously mapped out for me."

That one lingering choice turned into a 15-year odyssey. Simpkin began following INXS—not as a starstruck fan angling for attention, but as a steady, camera-wielding witness to the rhythm of their lives. He moved quietly, observing patiently. By the time Richard was taking photos of Michael blowing out candles at his 32nd birthday party—complete with streamers and balloons Richard had hung in the recording studio—their relationship had evolved far beyond typical fan encounters.

The photographs built up slowly, like sediment—layer by layer, year by year—tracing the shape of a friendship as it quietly deepened. Each frame held something: a glance, a backdrop, a sliver of the puzzle that was Michael Hutchence. By 2015, Richard was sitting on an archive so dense and personal it could no longer stay boxed up in hard drives and memory.

"The Michael book was like me giving birth," he says, the words landing with raw, creative exhaustion. "My baby." For two months straight, he made the daily drive from the eastern suburbs to the northern beaches, parking himself beside the publisher and laying out the book by hand. Every page was a negotiation. "It had to be perfect. Like a jigsaw puzzle...That photo had to go with that photo."

When Michael in Pictures was finally released in 2015, it carried a price tag of $125. For a brief, golden stretch, it was everywhere—TV spots, radio interviews, magazine spreads. The early sales were strong. But like everything, the moment moved on.

"Somebody else comes out with a book on Mick Jagger," Richard shrugs. "Then they're out doing the rounds, and people forget. The hype goes, and it's finished again."

Within a year, boxes of unsold books sat stacked in warehouses. The publisher offered them back at $50 each, minimum order of 100. Richard couldn't swing it. "I made no money from the book," he confesses. The leftover books began to drift—discount tables, bargain bins, second-hand shops. Richard found himself driving from shop to shop, scanning dusty shelves. "My babies were in bins," he says, half-laughing, half-horrified. "I was like Angelina Jolie, buying up my children."

Then, in 2019, something shifted. Richard Lowenstein's documentary Mystify landed like a slow-burning revelation. It made Michael feel real again—complicated, vulnerable, dazzlingly human. Fans weren't just reminiscing anymore; they were asking questions, peeling back the myth in search of the man.

That hunger led them to Richard's book.

"I started getting messages out of nowhere," he says. "'Hey, I just found out about your book—can't find it anywhere.' I had six copies left. I'd bought them back for 20 bucks each. Sold them for 50. Finally making money off my book."

The trickle turned into a flood. Facebook groups lit up. INXS forums buzzed. eBay listings disappeared within hours. "It became word of mouth," Richard says. "People were saying, 'This is the best Michael Hutchence book ever.'"

Collectors pounced with the speed of people who knew exactly what they were looking at. Within weeks, Michael in Pictures started appearing on resale sites—first for $200, then $500. These days, four-figure listings appear like gold bars in a dusty attic. One eBay listing sits at $2,000.

"The irony is, I can't afford my own book," Richard grins at the absurdity.

What happened to Michael in Pictures tapped into something larger—a quiet shift in how we value things. In a world where everything is streamed, swiped, or stored in the cloud, physical objects have started to feel rare, almost sacred. This book isn't just paper and print—it's presence. Made with care and built around a story, it becomes a vessel of memory, something real you can hold.

"It's a piece of memorabilia," Richard says. "Not just a book. It's big. Like four-and-a-half kilos. A true coffee table book." That physicality matters. The size, the weight, the glossy pages—they demand attention. In an age of the ephemeral, this book insists on being noticed.

Fans beg him for a reprint. Messages flood in. But it's not that simple. The original run cost $70,000. The publisher won't take the risk again. "That's why it's so rare," Richard says. "Why it costs so much now. There'll never be another."

Michael in Pictures wasn't made to be rare. It became rare because it was made with care. In Australia's cultural landscape, where authenticity cuts through manufactured hype, Richard's patient documentation of a friendship has found its true value—not in initial sales figures, but in the quiet recognition that some stories deserve to be preserved, held, and treasured.

"You never know if anyone else will like what you make," Simpkin reflects. "But if you're happy with it, you just hope they connect with it too."