SAMO BASQUIAT

Jean-Michel Basquiat photographed by Andy Warhol

Who was Jean-Michel Basquiat?

Jean-Michel Basquiat was born on December 22, 1960 in Brooklyn, New York. His career spanned just one short decade, yet he is considered one of the best-known artists of his generation and one of only a small number of Hispanic-African-American artists to achieve international recognition. Graduating from subway walls to canvas and from the streets of New York to the galleries of SoHo, the artist and his work remain a mystery to those who seek explanation.

Jean-Michel hit the streets of New York at a young age where art became an outlet. Also known by the tag “SAMO,” Jean-Michel’s unique brand of graffiti was found throughout Manhattan as early as 1976. “His work from the first consisted of conceptual, enigmatic combinations of words and symbols, executed with the curt simplicity of a late Roman inscription”, according toHenry Geldzahler, longtime curator of twentieth-century art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Jean-Michel was 18 when he approached Geldzahler and Andy Warhol in a SoHo restaurant. He sold Andy a postcard for one dollar but was dismissed by Geldzahler as “too young.” Less than three years later (1981) he was invited by artist and filmmaker, Diego Cortez, to participate in the P.S. 1 show, (Institute for Art and Urban Resources), alongside more than twenty artists including Keith Haring, Robert Mapplethorpe, Kenny Sharf and Andy Warhol.

In early 1982 Jean-Michel took the art world by storm with his one-man show at Annina Nosei’s gallery. This momentum propelled him to the forefront of the Neo-Expressionist movement which was characterized by intense subjectivity of feeling and aggressively raw handling of materials. Jean-Michel, accustomed to pushing the envelope in all aspects of his life, had something special to offer the neo-expressionist admirer: “I cross out words so you will see them more – the fact that they are obscured makes you want to read them.”

By the age of 24 Jean-Michel would be a veteran of one-man shows under the guidance of such notable art dealers as Nosei, Larry Gagosian, Mary Boone andBruno Bischofberger. Bischofberger introduced Jean-Michel’s art overseas as well as orchestrated the joint collaboration of Warhol and Basquiat in 1985 which involved some 60 works.

In the end Jean-Michel preferred drugs and women over the cultivated art world and was unable to balance fame and fortune with his personal demons. He passed away on August 12th 1988, at the age of 27, the result of a drug overdose.