Madonna faces backlash as she posts naked in 'morbid' Marilyn Monroe-inspired photoshoot

Madonna graces the cover of a magazine topless and with only a thong on as she reenacts the final shoot Marilyn Monroe participated in before she died in 1962.

The singer bared her bottom as she laid facedown on a mattress in fishnet stockings and stiletto heels in one of her photos for the latest issue of V Magazine. In another shot, she faces the camera while being surrounded by prescription bottles on the floor and on a nightstand.

Photographer Steven Klein said the photos were inspired by the last photoshoot Monroe did with Bert Stern called "The Last Sitting." It was taken six weeks before she was found dead in her Brentwood, California home on August 4, 1962, from an overdose on sedative drugs.

"They shot at the Bel Air hotel in 1962 before she passed away. What was supposed to be a three-hour sitting, turned into a three-day whirlwind, working night and day. Drinking, laughing, shooting photos, editing, sleeping, and then taking more photos–a private affair between two artists which rarely happens anymore. We were not interested in recreating the images exactly but more importantly, we wanted to explore the relationship between photographer and subject. Both the friendship and the artistic process, and how art can imitate life and vice versa," Klein said of his photos of Madonna.

He said when he proposed the idea to the 63-year-old singer "she was really taken by the incandescent fragility of Marilyn at that moment in her life." They then "decided to find a hotel suite and try to capture the liaison between a star and the camera, the mystery, and magic of this creative collaboration." Klein shared his hope that they have "done justice to the great work of Bert Stern and Marilyn Monroe."

Netizens did not think highly of the photos though and some even claimed it was inappropriate and in bad taste. Pop culture expert Mike Sington called it "morbid and eerie" that Madonna decided "to recreate Monroe's death bed."

"Another commented, "Yuck. Gross and inappropriate." Others claimed that Madonna is only "embarrassing herself" trying to imitate Monroe for the photoshoot while one netizen called it "sad" that she "still needs so much attention."