Gabriele Galimberti Is Not Happy With Drake

The Italian photographer feels that Drake's recent reference to his book The Ameriguns is "pretty clear."

An image posted to Gabriele Galimberti’s Instagram, from his photography project and book The Ameriguns.

Gabriele Galimberti's photos have made the rounds more than once — and it's often without credit. The award-winning Italian photographer has specialized in documenting people and objects, including gun owners, for 25 years. I remember seeing images from his book The Ameriguns for the first time in 2022, when the tragic Uvalde school shooting occurred in Texas. Conversations online around Galimberti's images were imbued with an intense, feverish energy that spoke to the power of his work.

I saw Galimberti's visual formula again over the holiday weekend — except this time, in addition to not being credited, his work was entirely duplicated. On the evening of July 4, Drake garnered attention by premiering his latest single "What Did I Miss?" during a live stream. The visual, which is not yet an official video, features Drake standing poolside on a patio, surrounded by row after row of firearms. If you've seen Galimberti's work, it's evident that Drake was directly inspired by the photographer. But Galimberti says he was never contacted about the reference. "I didn't know anything about that," the journalist told me in an interview on Sunday, July 6. "Nobody asked me."

Screenshot from Drake’s live stream during the weekend of July 4, 2025.

This is far from the first time Drake has neither asked for permission nor forgiveness. During the promotion of 2022's Her Loss, a joint album with Atlanta rapper 21 Savage, the teams of the two MCs allegedly created counterfeit issues of Vogue magazine and distributed copies of it in "North America's largest metropolitan areas," in addition to spreading posters of the falsified cover. The "issue" was also posted to the social media accounts of both Drake and 21 Savage, for more than 135 million collective followers to see. Vogue's parent company Condé Nast sued Drake and 21 Savage, who reached a settlement with the entity in 2023.

Elsewhere, in non-legal territory, Drake promoted his 2023 SZA collaboration "Slime You Out" by using cover art of Halle Berry getting slimed at the 2012 Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards. "Didn't get my permission," she wrote in the comments of an Instagram post after the song was released. "That's not cool, I thought better of him!" In another comment, she wrote, "When people you admire disappoint you, you have to be the bigger person and move on!"

Drake has left a trail of disappointed people and creatives in his wake on his quest for relevance, and Galimberti is no different. "Ninety-nine percent of the people know Drake, but don't know me," the renowned artist said. "I'm pretty sure that 99 percent of the people that have seen that video think that Drake had an original idea to put all the guns together around the swimming pool. Most of the people don't know that somebody did it before him."

In this conversation, Gabriele Galimberti discusses the origins of his book, The Ameriguns, which will be reprinted in its fifth edition later this month. You can find more information on the publisher’s site and on his Instagram. Galimberti also touches on his initial reaction to finding out about Drake's reference, and how his life has (or has not) changed since the rapper's uncredited nod to his work.

All photos from The Ameriguns have been shared with Galimberti's permission.

An image posted to Gabriele Galimberti’s Instagram, from his photography project and book The Ameriguns.

How have the past 24 to 48 hours been for you?

Okay, I will say. I got a lot of attention on Instagram. So many people tagged me and I received, I would say, 25 to 30 messages from people and agencies and media. But it's pretty quiet. So nothing really special is happening, to be honest.

I live in Texas and I know that your early origins in the US were in Texas. So I just wanted to talk about your experience here and also the origins of The Ameriguns.

Oof, it's a long story. The first time that I was in Texas, it was 25 years ago, more or less. Because I met a girl in Italy, and we were together for a couple of years, and she's from Texas. She brought me there, basically, and that was my first time in the USA in 2002, if I don't remember wrong. And since that moment, I think I came to the USA probably 30 times, more than one time per year. And then by the time I became a photographer, and I became an actual documentary photographer, and now it's been more than 10 years that I've worked for National Geographic magazine in the USA in Washington. I'm based in Italy, but I work for the American edition of National Geographic.

And the origins of The Ameriguns, I've photographed people and objects since 25 years. My first project was about kids and toys, and then I made another one about people and medicines and collections and food and so on. And in 2019, I was in the USA working for National Geographic magazine on a story about dinosaurs, collectors. I was taking photos of people collecting bones of dinosaurs.

I was in Kansas and I had five days off. I was getting bored, and I decided to enter a gun shop because I remember that since my first time in the USA, I'd seen many, many, many gun shops, but I never went inside. That day I simply said, "Okay, it's time to go inside and see what they sell." I was simply curious to check what was inside.

When I entered into this gun shop in Kansas City, I basically discovered something that I didn't know. I discovered that they don't only sell guns, they sell any kind of weapons, basically. That triggered my curiosity, and I spoke with a couple of clients. One of the clients was pretty open to speak with me. To make a story short, two hours later, I was at his place and I took a picture of him together with all the guns he had in the house, which were more than 50.

The first photo basically happened by chance. I was not really planning to make a story about guns in America. A couple of days later, I was traveling to Texas and I was in Dallas, and I decided to try again. I went into a gun shop and I spoke with some people. One girl decided to pose for me. I simply asked, "How many guns do you have at home?" And she said, "Oh, I don't know, maybe more than 60, 70. I don't even count them." And I said, "Can I come and take a picture of you and your guns?" She said, "Okay, yeah, come over." Within three days, I had two portraits of two people, one in Kansas, one in Texas, both of them with more than 50 guns. From that moment, I decided to try to make a project.

I started to do some research to find numbers. This is something that is not easy to discover, but in the USA there are more guns than people. Forty-eight percent of the global guns are in the USA, but you are 4 percent of the population. And so the numbers are really, really, really high in the USA. I decided to photograph these numbers. I asked for a sponsorship from National Geographic and they sponsored me to make the project. So they gave me a budget to keep working on the story, and I worked on the story for more than one year. Which means, I would say, seven to eight months of research, and then four months of traveling in the USA.

Thank you so much for explaining. Before I get into my questions about Drake's reference, is this a clear reference to your work?

I think so. I think it's pretty clear. I mean, I didn't know anything about that. Nobody asked me. I don't know if they had to ask me to try to use that kind of image. But I didn't know that Drake was doing something that is actually really, really similar to my photos. Anyways, yeah, it was a surprise. Yesterday morning, many friends started to send me messages to see. They sent me a link to the video and people from Instagram, people that I don't know, started to send me messages, telling me that Drake was referring to my photos with the video. It was a surprise. I think that there is a reference to my photos in the video.

What was your initial reaction when you found out?

The first reaction was surprising. It's something between a positive surprise and a negative surprise. Because somehow, I felt like I was inspiring an artist. If you see the story from that side, it is a good thing. But on the other side, I felt like I should be asked. That kind of visual formula is my formula since 25 years. As I told you, the last project that I've done is about Americans and guns, but I've done 10 books using the same visual formula with different topics.

And then I also did it for National Geographic many times. So my photos are pretty well known. I won the World Press Photo [Portrait Stories Contest] a few years ago and I won many other awards with my photos. So I was kind of expecting that somebody from the label would ask me if they can use the same thing; the same photos, basically.

That's completely fair. I was very curious about that, as well. How do you feel about the significance of Drake dropping these visuals that are clearly inspired by you on the weekend of July 4th? I read an article that you wrote around July 4th a few years ago and you kind of explained your interpretation. So what do you think of the significance of Drake doing this at this time?

You know, to be honest with you, I didn't have time to really check the song. I didn't even hear the whole song, because these days, I'm working. I'm in Spain shooting for another client, so yesterday was super, super busy and today, the same. I didn't have time to listen to the song, read articles about the song. I don't even know if Drake is pro- or anti-guns, to be honest with you. I don't have a clear answer to your question.

I can only say that, you know, when I made my project, I tried to — I'm a storyteller. I'm not someone that wants to suggest a position to take. My book is neutral. Of course, I have my personal idea about guns, but I don't suggest my idea into my book. When you take my book and read my book, you will get a neutral story. I simply photograph what I see, and I interview people, and I report things that they say. I don't know if maybe you know better than me. Do you know if Drake is anti-guns or pro-guns?

Well, as I alluded to in my email, over the past few to several years, Drake has been shifting to the right, politically and ideologically. He's collaborating or appearing with artists who are of that ilk. So, it's clear that he's interested in it. But as far as guns, particularly, I don't know what his thoughts are.

And what is the song about?

To be honest, it's about his friends not being his friends anymore. He's very deeply hurt by the Kendrick Lamar beef that happened last year, and the fact that the people that he thought were loyal to him are, in his opinion, in his view, no longer on his side.

Okay, and why do you think he's using all these guns in the video? What's the connection between the lyrics and the guns?

So Kendrick, last year, really made a hard-hitting point that he doesn't want to see Drake act tough. He says, "I like Drake with the melodies, I don't like Drake when he act tough." That's a lyric from "Euphoria." So Drake, in my opinion — this is just me speaking candidly — it seems as though Drake wants to be seen as tough and he wants to make his songs with melodies, because this song does have melodies in it.

He put out a song last year called "No Face" that was very aggressive, in your face, very "I'm a tough guy." And this song is more like melodic, sing-songy, pop-era Drake. It's kind of interesting because he's juxtaposing these visuals with the nature of the song. So yeah, I guess he's trying to say, "If you turn on me, I have something for you" type situation? I'm not really sure, I'm still wrapping my head around it myself.

Okay, got it. Thank you. That's not the official video, right?

No.

So the official video didn't come out yet, right?

Correct. This was in a live stream that he is promoting, we're assuming, for his upcoming album. So it's a visual. There are two scenes in the video: It opens up with the reference to your work and then it switches to him in a freezer of some sort just dancing by himself.

Did you know that the video was referring to my photos? Did somebody tell you?

I remember seeing your work around the time of the Uvalde shootings. I was aware of it. I was like, "Wait a minute. This looks familiar." Once I remembered that, then that's when I kind of put the pieces together. I don't know if you can speak to this question, but what do you think it means that a Canadian artist is referring to a culture that is so deeply American?

Oh, that's really hard to say. Is he still living in Canada? Where does he live now? Maybe he's actually American now, more than Canadian?

He actually has a home about an hour and a half outside of Houston, so he's in Texas. He goes to small bars a lot in the area that he lives in. He's always in Houston at certain clubs and things like that. So he is very present in the US.

I really don't know how to answer your question. It's not my culture and again, I love the States. I made my project because I was curious to understand one specific… one specific… I don't know that word in English, I'm sorry. I'm thinking in Italian now. I'm trying to get the right thing to say. I'm a journalist and I really like to tell stories. And it's not easy for me to take a position, even answering your question would mean to take a position on something. And that's something that I don't want to do at the moment. I don't really know how to answer you.

I understand. I'll continue with my questions — if you feel uncomfortable answering anything, you can just say "pass." As we know, Drake is one of the most influential artists globally. What kind of impact does it have when someone like him nods to your work?

At the moment, the only impact that I can say is that I got a thousand followers more on Instagram. That's the only thing happening right now. Your interview and a couple of other blogs that want to speak with me. So, I have just a little exposition, like maybe two or three days of exposition. But this is the only thing happening now.

Okay, that's fair.

Yeah. Not really much, to be honest. Even because I think it would have been different if it was clear about saying that it was inspired by my photos. But the general public doesn't know that I am a photographer. I mean, you know because you are a journalist, maybe you know because you have seen my photos on the web and you have a good memory and maybe you remember, "Oh, I've seen this kind of photo somewhere else." Ninety-nine percent of the people know Drake, but don't know me. I'm pretty sure that 99 percent of the people that have seen that video think that Drake had an original idea to put all the guns together around the swimming pool. Most of the people don't know that somebody did it before him.

Have you seen any commentary around the reference? And if so, how do you feel about how it's being interpreted?

Again, I didn't have time to read everything that I received. I think I will do it from Friday because I still have three days of full work in Spain. If you have time and if you want to speak with me again over the weekend, I will have a better idea. I need some time to read everything and to feel what I really feel. I don't know now. I didn't have time to think around what happened with the video. I can say that I'm not really happy that I see a clear reference to my work without being called. Or maybe even, you know, my name is not written anywhere. Nobody from Drake's team got in touch with me, but I'm pretty sure that the reference is clear.

If you had a chance to speak to Drake or his team about this reference, what would you want to say or ask?

I want to take time to check something about him, because if he's using, let's say, my photos to promote guns, that makes things even worse, because I'm not really pro-guns. So I would not be happy if my visual formula would be used to promote guns. That was not my intention. My intention was to tell a story. But of course, if then my vision is used to promote something that is not really in line with what I think, I'm not really happy about that.