‘Exploitation at its worst’: Kendall and Kylie Jenner apologise and withdraw music icon T-shirts

Reality television celebrities Kendall and Kylie Jenner apologised on Thursday after causing an uproar for selling pricey T-shirts featuring their faces printed over images of famed music groups and artists including The Doors, Pink Floyd, Ozzy Osbourne and slain rappers Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G.

In the second recent marketing misstep involving members of the Kardashian family, Kendall and Kylie Jenner said they had withdrawn their US$125 T-shirt line from sale a day after it was launched.

“These designs were not well thought out and we deeply apologise to anyone that has been upset and/or offended, especially to the families of the artists,” the Jenner sisters said in a statement.

“We are huge fans of their music and it was not our intention to disrespect these cultural icons in anyway,” they added.

The move followed outrage from relatives of some of the artists, and cease and desist letters from other musicians over unauthorised use of the images.

“Girls, you haven’t earned the right to put your face with musical icons. Stick to what you know … lip gloss,” Sharon Osbourne, the wife of Black Sabbath frontman Ozzy Osbourne, wrote on Twitter.