Jean-Michel Basquiat

Basquiat was famous as a graffiti artist and as a very successful Neo-expressionist. He is the author of a series of crazy paintings.

From childhood, the painter spoke English, French and Spanish. Young Basquiat read Symbolist poems, as well as myths and historical books. He became interested in arts at an early age and also dreamt of becoming a cartoonist.

There were three periods of Basquiat’s creativity. In the early period, from 1980 to 1982, he often depicted skeletons and mask-like faces, in which his extraordinary interest in mortality was expressed. The artist also depicted street life: cars, buildings, police, children’s games on the sidewalk, and graffiti. The middle period, from the end of 1982 to 1985, was marked by Basquiat’s interest in his Haitian roots. The last period, from 1986 to his death in 1988, is marked by a new manner and new characters. “I do not think about art when I’m working. I try to think about life,” Jean-Michel said.

Basquiat often slept on streets to express his love for freedom. Moreover, he brought home stuff he found in garbage bins and used it in his art. The artist painted pictures on broken doors, boxes and even car tires. Every day, Basquiat took drugs and worked around for 20 hours, turning all this garbage into extraordinary works of art.

He called himself a legend, never cared for words of art critics and claimed “nobody needs a critic to find out what art is”.

Key ideas:

– The artist devoted his works to the problems of racism and the history of African-American culture.

– Many paintings from the artist are full of written words. Art historian Robert Farris Thompson said: “It is as if he was dripping letters.”

– Based on Basquiat’s meteoric success and the uniqueness of his works, art experts compared him to Pablo Picasso. They even called him “the black Picasso”.

– Some of the most popular subjects for Basquiat were composers and musicians, especially Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. The artist himself was once a musician and had his own band. He thus looked to jazz music for inspiration, much in the same way that he looked to other modern painters.