• Photographer Marcus Hyde, who has taken photos of celebrities including Kim Kardashian West and Ariana Grande, is under scrutiny after 20-year-old model Sunnaya Nash published screenshots of messages with Hyde, in which he tried to bribe her with a free photoshoot in exchange for her sending him nude photos.
• Other women are now coming forward also accusing Hyde of sexual misconduct.
• In the wake of the accusations against Hyde, Kardashian West and Grande have spoken out about the photographer.
• Visit INSIDER's homepage for more stories.

When 20-year-old model Sunnaya Nash first saw on Instagram that celebrity photographer Marcus Hyde was looking for new models to shoot, she immediately reached out.

Nash, an interior design student living in Los Angeles, was a long-time fan of Hyde's work — he was known for taking photos of influential celebrities like Kim Kardashian West, Kanye West, and Ariana Grande, to name a few. And after the photographer was injured in a near-fatal car accident last year, she couldn't wait for him to reemerge online. When she saw his Instagram story looking for fresh talent, indicating that he was back on the scene and ready to shoot, she considered it a prime opportunity to boost her career in a cut-throat industry.

"If you're a smaller model and a larger photographer wants to shoot with you, that's always going to hopefully be positive for your career and that's always going to be something exciting for you," Nash said in an interview with INSIDER. "That's just kind of how it is. It's definitely a who-you-know type of industry and the more people you know, the better jobs you'll get. And that's just kind of how it goes."

Nash was on her way to a friend's birthday party in Ojai, a small city surrounded by rolling hills and mountains located around two hours outside of downtown Los Angeles, when she sent Marcus a message expressing her interest. He responded back immediately, asking Nash if she could send him a few digital images taken on her iPhone. 

'I don't need to shoot you, I'm going to keep shooting celebrities.'

After sending those initial photos, however, the mood shifted. Hyde wanted nudes, Nash told INSIDER. When she expressed her discomfort, instead offering to shoot lingerie or partial nudity, he told her that the photoshoot would cost $2,000.

"But nude is free?" Nash asked, in an Instagram exchange that she later posted on Twitter and that has since gone viral. "Ya," Hyde responded back curtly. She then offered to shoot nude, but said that she didn't want to send those photos in advance. "Then don't," Hyde said with a smiley face emoji.

When she continued to press about why Hyde wanted the nude photos, he told her: "Gotta see if your [sic] worth it."

Looking back on the incident,  Nash told INSIDER that she wasn't too shocked by Hyde's behavior, explaining that it is fairly typical for male photographers in the industry to come in with big egos. She described his actions as manipulative, especially since she was willing to do partial nudity or lingerie.

"I felt like that was enough, but I didn't want to miss an opportunity of shooting with one of the photographers that I really admired," she said. "He continued to be increasingly rude and kind of degrading, saying things like 'I don't need to shoot you, I'm going to keep shooting celebrities.'" At that point, irritated by his actions, Nash posted the thread online. After the Instagram account Diet Prada, which focuses on the fashion industry, posted her exchange with Hyde, the story blew up.

Nash said she never could have expected the wave of responses that followed, with scores of messages from women who also claim they were preyed upon by Hyde. She told INSIDER that she has read messages of women describing how Hyde asked them to touch themselves while taking nude photos; of him trying to persuade them into having sex with him; witholding their photos, even if they had paid, if they refused to sleep with him; and instances in which Hyde would put his hand in their vaginas while they were on shoots.

"There were models who said that he was acting abusive towards them and they told their modeling agencies and the agencies just said 'well, that's the industry, we can't do anything about it' and continue sending the models, and that was very alarming to me that the agencies were not taking this seriously," she added. She has since posted some of the anonymous messages she received about Hyde on her Twitter page.

INSIDER has reached out to Hyde for comment, as well as to Facebook about his social media accounts. "We deactivated @marcushyde [Instagram] for violating our sexual solicitation policies," a spokesperson told INSIDER. At time of publication, his Facebook page appears to remain active.

BuzzFeed noted that hours after Nash posted her DM conversation with Hyde, Instagram removed her story for "bullying or harassment." A Facebook spokesperson told INSIDER the content "was removed in error and has been reinstated. We apologize to Sunnaya for the mistake."

Kim Kardashian West and Ariana Grande come forward

Hyde is hardly the only professional photographer who's been accused of inappropriate behavior in the last few years. Terry Richardson, who's worked with dozens of high fashion brands and magazines, and published more than a dozen books, has repeatedly been accused of sexual misconduct since 2001. In 2017, following public pressure, many brands pledged to no longer work with him. And in early 2018, several male models accused both Mario Testino and Bruce Weber of inappropriate sexual conduct on set. 

In the wake of Hyde's alleged sexual misconduct, Grande and Kardashian West have both come forward with statements about the photographer. On Monday night, in an Instagram story, Grande wrote: "dear models/artists in LA / anywhere, i have just read some shocking and really heartbreaking stories. i hate that this is a conversation... please do not shoot with photographers who make you uncomfortable or make you feel like you need to take your clothing off if you don't want to... I promise there are so many respectful, nice, talented photographers out there." 

Kardashian West added in an Instagram story that while her own experiences with Hyde were always professional, "I am deeply shocked, saddened, and disappointed to learn that other women have had very different experiences... we cannot allow this type of behavior to go unnoticed and I applaud those who speak out."

At the time of INSIDER's interview with Nash, Kardashian had yet to post her Instagram story. When questioned on Grande's response, Nash said that she felt her post was "kind of weak and kind of model blaming."

"Her post was really just saying 'you don't have to shoot with photographers who make you feel uncomfortable, like you don't have to do this' which is kind of missing the point. And she didn't mention his name at all," she explained, adding that she views the bigger picture as "want[ing] to protect women from getting in these dangerous situations with people that we look up to and we think we can trust because we see them with these celebrities who we admire."

"I think when you see someone who's shooting big celebrities that you look up to, like Ariana Grande and Kim Kardashian, you think that 'oh, like he wants to shoot me, this could mean I'm worth something, this can mean it could help my career,' and that's obviously very exciting," she said. "You don't expect him to be an abuser because he's worked with so many professionals."

If you have more information related to these allegations, please contact this reporter at neinbinder@businessinsider.com.

• Read more:
• Former Senator Al Franken says he regrets resigning from office over sexual misconduct allegations
• Disney quietly removed a scene from new releases of 'Toy Story 2' that hasn't aged well in the #MeToo era
• How Trump, Kim Kardashian, and the US government got involved in trying to free rapper A$AP Rocky from a Swedish jail

   

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: 30 products new parents will love