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Jean-Michel Basquiat was born on December 22,
1960 in Park Slope, Brooklyn to Gerard and Matilde. Gerard Basquiat was born in
Haiti. He came from a well-to-to family and went on to be a relatively
successful accountant in New York. Matilde Basquiat Andradas was the daughter of
Puerto Rican immigrants in Brooklyn.
Jean-Michel was far more close to his mother,
Matilde. Matilde spoke Caribbean Spanish to young Jean and he learned the
language early on. She took Jean to see museums and the paintings in them. In
1966, at the ripe old age of six, Jean-Michel already carried a card identifying
him as a "junior member" of the Brooklyn Museum. In May of 1968, while
playing softball on East 35th street in Brooklyn, a passing
automobile hit Basquiat. He breaks his arm and surgeons had to remove his
spleen. While he was recovering in the hospital, his mother brought him a copy
of Gray’s Anatomy to read. We can see from his later paintings just how much
this text was instantly Rolodexed into his memory. Jean-Michel’s noise band
will later be called Gray, surely after the anatomy book of the same name.
Matilde was also encouraging Jean to continue with his artistic interests,
humbly aware that Michelangelo and all great painters studied anatomy. When
asked if he thought Gray’s text helped heal, immersing his consciousness in
drawings and names of the working parts of the body Basquiat answered,
"Sounds true."
In 1974 Gerard Basquiat, now separated from
Matilde, moved with his children to Mira Mar, Puerto Rico. They lived there
until 1976. This year and a half immersion, when Jean-Michel was in his early
teens reinforced his Spanish. He later vacationed again to the island in 1987.
Jean-Michel dropped
out of school in 1977. He lived in abandoned buildings and supported himself
with odd jobs until 1978. This is about the time when he fell into an early
graffiti movement with his friend Al Diaz. Together, Al and Jean-Michel begin
collaborating on SAMO, a character that makes a living selling fake religion.
The two begin spray painting phrases and cryptic texts around Lower Manhattan
such as "SAMO IS AN END TO MINDWASH", "SAMO SAVES IDIOTS", and "PLUSH SAFE HE
THINK." The icon of traditional graffiti holds fast to Basquiat’s answer to an
interviewer’s question: "What is your subject matter?" to which he replied.
"Royalty, heroism, and the streets."
In 1978, Basquiat
begins to sell hand painted postcards and t-shirts to make money. He approaches
Andy Warhol and Henry Geldzahler or Bruno Bischofberger, I’m not sure which, in
a Soho restaurant. He sells some of the art to Warhol.
In June of 1980,
Basquiat’s art was publicly exhibited for the first time in a group show. In
December of 1981, poet and artist/critic Rene Ricard publishes the first major
article on Basquiat entitled "The Radiant Child" in Artforum magazine. In 1982,
Basquiat was featured in a group show along with Francesco Clemente, David
Salle, and Julian Schnabel. Schnabel will later go on to write and direct the
biographical film Basquiat in 1996.
In 1983, Basquiat is
included in the "1983 Biennial Exhibition" at the Whitney Museum of American
Art. It is also in 1983 that Basquiat was befriended by Warhol. They go on to
become close friends and collaborate on many pieces together.
By 1984 many of
Basquiat's friends become concerned about his excessive drug use. His paranoia
was also fueled by the very real threat of people stealing work from his
apartment and art dealers taking unfinished work from his
studio. On February 10, 1985, Basquiat appears on the cover of The New York
Times Magazine. At Christie’s spring auction of contemporary paintings
Basquiat’s UNTITLED (SKULL) 1981 brings in a record $19,000. The painting had
originally sold for $4,000 the year before. Basquiat is 23 years old.
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Note left by
Jean-Michel on the door of his Great Jones loft
after Warhol's death. |
By 1985, Basquiat’s
deteriorating health becomes more noticeable, particularly the dark spots on his
face. These discolored patches might have been caused by the removal of his
spleen, which kept his body from cleaning out the toxins from the drugs he took
throughout his life. In the months before his death Basquiat claimed to be doing
up to a hundred bags of heroin a day.
On February 22, 1987
Andy Warhol dies. Basquiat appears devastated by his
loss. He paints GRAVESTONE, a memorial to Warhol. It is said that the death of
Andy Warhol made the death of Basquiat inevitable as somehow Warhol was the only
person that could always bring Basquiat back from the so-called edge.
After Andy died there was no one that Jean-Michel was in such awe of that he
would respond to.
On Friday, August
22, 1988, inside his 57 Great Jones Street loft, Jean-Michel Basquiat, American
painter, died of a heroin overdose. He was 27 years old.
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[Additional
Biographical Info.]
www.clyffordstill.net/basquiat/bio.html
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