SAMO the “Postmodern Muse” -
Jean-Michel Basquiat born December 22, 1960 was an American artist of Haitian and Puerto Rican descent. Basquiat first achieved fame as part of SAMO, an informal graffiti duo who wrote enigmatic epigrams in the cultural hotbed of the Lower East Side of Manhattan during the late 1970s, where rap, punk, and street art coalesced into early hip-hop music culture.
I remember the first time I saw a painting by Basquiat, the raw emotion grabbed on to my heart. I could see his feelings in every stroke on the canvas. From pain to pride and culture in both history and present time. His rough images paired with bold colors awoke my mind leaving me searching for more within his artworks. Like an art addiction.
His rough images paired with bold colors awoke my mind leaving me searching for more within his artworks. Like an art addiction.
- Johnny Blanco
Basquiat sold his first painting, Cadillac Moon (1981), to singer Debbie Harry, front woman of the punk rock band Blondie, for $200
"I don't think about art when I'm working. I try to think about life".
- Jean-Michel Basquiat
By the early 1980s, his neo-expressionist paintings were being exhibited in galleries and museums internationally. At 21, Basquiat became the youngest artist to ever take part in Documenta in Kassel. At 22, he was the youngest to exhibit at the Whitney Biennial in New York. The Whitney Museum of American Art held a retrospective of his art in 1992.
In 1982 Basquait began to see a pre-stardom Madonna and many called her his “Postmodern Muse”. Basquiat was living in a loft in Lower East Side. His place was covered with his work, and his clothes were scattered everywhere. A dark halo covered this enigmatic artist, and in this chaotic little world Madonna accompanied him in silence, simply waiting for him to finish his next masterpiece.
In 1982 Basquait began to see a pre-stardom Madonna and many called her his “Postmodern Muse”. Basquiat was living in a loft in Lower East Side. His place was covered with his work, and his clothes were scattered everywhere. A dark halo covered this enigmatic artist, and in this chaotic little world Madonna accompanied him in silence, simply waiting for him to finish his next masterpiece.
“I remember getting up in the middle of the night and he wouldn’t be in bed lying next to me; he’d be standing, painting, at four in the morning, this close to the canvas, in a trance. I was blown away by that, that he worked when he felt moved.”
- Madonna
Basquiat used social commentary in his paintings as a tool for introspection and for identifying with his experiences in the black community of his time, as well as attacks on power structures and systems of racism. Basquiat's visual poetics were acutely political and direct in their criticism of colonialism and support for class struggle.
Owners of paintings at the Orlando Museum of Art have previously been questioned about fraudulent paintings according to the FBI.
Along with the rise in popularity of Basquiat's paintings we have also seen the rise of sophisticated forgeries. The owners of a collection of paintings by Jean-Michel Basquiat valued at $100 million are under investigation by the FBI, which suspects the works are forgeries. Court records and an affidavit filed by the FBI to procure a search warrant indicate the owners have previously been involved with forged works of Jackson Pollack.
Basquiat Estate and 1800 Tequila creative collaboration
Since his death at the age of 27 (August 12, 1988) from a heroin overdose, his work has steadily increased in value. At a Sotheby's auction in May 2017,Untitled, a 1982 painting by Basquiat depicting a black skull with red and yellow rivulets, sold for $110.5million, becoming one of the most expensive paintings ever purchased. It also set a new record high for an American artist at auction.