Biography

Basquiat Biography

Jean-Michel Basquiat was born in Brooklyn, New York, on December 22, 1960, shortly after the death of his elder brother, Max. He was the second of four children of Matilda Andrades and Gérard Basquiat. He had two younger sisters: Lisane, born in 1964, and Jeanine, born in 1967.

His father, Gérard Basquiat, a CPA immigrated from Port-au- Prince, Haiti. His mother, Matilde Basquiat, was born in Brooklyn, New York of Puerto Rican parents.

Matilde instilled a love for art in her young son by taking him to museums eventually enrolling him as a junior member of the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

Basquiat was an intelligent and curious child who learned to read and write by age four in a household that spoke three languages. His mother who loved to paint and draw encouraged her son's artistic interests. Basquiat started attending Saint Anne's, an arts-oriented exclusive private school.

In September 1968, when Basquiat was eight, he was hit by a car while playing in the street. His arm was broken and he suffered internal injuries eventually under going a splenectomy. While recuperating his mother gave him a copy of Gray's Anatomy to keep him occupied. The anatomical drawings from the book would have a life long influence on his work.

His parents separated that year and he and his sisters were raised by their father. The family resided in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn for five years, then moved to San Juan, Puerto Rico in 1974. After two years, they returned to New York City. By now Basquiat was fluent in English, French and Spanish and was an avid reader in all three languages. He had begun making illustrated books with friends from school and was participating in track.

At 13 his close relationship with his mother was interrupted when she was committed to a mental institution, she would live in out of care for the rest of her life. At 15, Basquiat ran away from home. He slept on park benches in Tompkins Square Park, and took LSD for the first time. He was arrested and returned to the care of his father, when they returned home he announced to his father that he would be famous.

Basquiat dropped out of Edward R. Murrow High School in the tenth grade and then attended City-As- School, an alternative high school in Manhattan where he first met Al Diaz who would become his close friend and collaborator. At Diaz's graduation, who was a year ahead of Basquiat he dumped a box full of shaving cream over the principles head and left the school for good. His father banished him from the household for dropping out of high school and Basquiat stayed with friends in Brooklyn.

Basquiat and Diaz began spray painting graffiti on buildings in Lower Manhattan working under the pseudonym SAMO. Their tags were combinations of images and texts with messages such as "Plush safe he think.. SAMO "SAMO as an escape clause". In 1978 while Basquiat was living rough, sleeping in parks and selling hand painted shirts and postcards as well as drugs to make money Harvey Russack discovered him painting a building one night, they became friends, and he offered him a day job. This would be Basquiat's first art related job.

He worked for the Unique Clothing Warehouse in their art department, at 718 Broadway in NoHo and at night he became "SAMO" painting graffiti on neighborhood buildings. On December 11, 1978, The Village Voice ran a piece about the downtown graffiti scene mentioning Basquiat and Diaz by name, this would be the first mention of Basquiat as an artist in print and he felt the fame he had been seeking since he was a child coming to him.

Basquiat and Diaz had a falling out and with it the SAMO project ended. The epitaph "SAMO IS DEAD" began showing up on walls and gallery fronts all through SoHo throughout the year 1979. That same year Basquiat appeared on the influential public-access cable TV show TV Party hosted by Glenn O'Brien. Basquiat made regular appearances on the show over the next few years and Glenn O'Brien would become an early fan and enabler of Basquiat work. That same year, Basquiat formed the noise rock band Test Pattern – which was later renamed Gray – which played at Arleen Schloss's open space,

"Wednesdays at A's";, where in October 1979 Basquiat showed, among others, his SAMO color Xerox work.

At the time Basquiat became a figure in the downtown Art scene. Meeting like minded graffiti based artists like Kieth Haring and Kenny Scharf from the school of visual arts. The Mudd Club where Punk, Noise and early Hip Hop were all being played and tested, became his main hangout and the chaotic downtown lifestyle of partying took root in his character.

In 1980, Basquiat starred in O'Brien's never released independent film Downtown 81, originally titled New York Beat. O'Brien introduced Basquiat to artists, musicians and celebrates. Eventually that same year, under much pressure from Basquiat O'Brien introduced him to Andy Warhol. Basquiat had previously sold Warhol some of his post cards at a SOHO restaurant and now showed him work that greatly impressed him. Through O'Brien Basquiat met Debby Harry who bought a painting for a 100$ and would cast him in a Blondie music video "Rapture," as a nightclub disc jockey.

The early 1980s were Basquiat's breakthrough as a solo artist. In June 1980, Basquiat participated and was singled out in the greatly influential "The Times Square Show", a multi-artist exhibition sponsored by Collaborative Projects Incorporated (Colab) and Fashion Moda.

Soon after Basquiat is invited to exhibit in the P.S.1 New York/ New wave show where he and many of his downtown cohorts are being noticed by the money people of the art world. He moves in with girlfriend Suzanne Mallouk who he will have a tumultuous on again off again relationship for many years.

In September of the same year, Basquiat joined the Annina Nosei gallery and was given space in the basement below the gallery as a studio. In 1982 Nosei opened his first one man show with great success. Later that year René Ricard published "The Radiant Child" in Artforum magazine, which brought Basquiat to the attention of the greater art world.

In March 1982 he worked in Modena, Italy. In New York he rents a loft on Crosby Street in order to work on new paintings for Nosei Gallery. In November he is invited to work from the ground-floor display and studio space Larry Gagosian built below his Venice, California home and commenced a series of paintings for a 1983 show, his second at Gagosian Gallery, then in West Hollywood. While staying in Los Angeles he rekindles a relationship with former girlfriend Madonna now on the verge of immense fame herself.

During this time he took considerable interest in the work that Robert Rauschenberg was producing at Gemini G.E.L. finding inspiration in the accomplishments of the painter.

In 1983, Basquiat produced a 12" rap single featuring hip-hop artists Rammellzee and K-Rob. Billed as Rammellzee vs. K-Rob, the single contained two versions of the same track:"Beat Bop" on side one with vocals and "Beat Bop" on side two as an instrumental. The single was pressed in limited quantities on the one-off Tartown Record Company label. The single's cover featured Basquiat's artwork, making the pressing highly desirable among both record and art collectors.

In 1983 Basquiat was back in New York and with money made in California he rents a loft building on Great Jones street from Andy Warhol. At this time, with the encouragement of Swiss dealer Bruno Bischofberger, Warhol and Basquiat begin a series of collaborative paintings. The relationship went far beyond professional and became a deep friendship with Warhol acting as mentor to Basquiat as prodigy.

Basquiat is included in the Whitney Biennial Exhibition as the youngest artist ever to be invited and his paintings are singled out for mention in the press. In September of that year graffiti writer Michael Stewart dies from injuries suffered while being arrested. The death effects Basquiat deeply who sees how easily that could have been him, young, black, tagging on the street. He makes work memorializing the death including "Defacement".

In 1984 Basquiat leaves Nosie gallery for Mary Bloom and has his first show there. A crowded show of smaller paintings it sells out but receives mixed reviews in the art press. Bruno Bishofburger becomes his European dealer. In May his paintings are included in the Museum of Modern Art's re-opening exhibition, "International Survey of Painting and Sculpture." In August he has his first solo museum show in Edinburgh, and two works are included in “Since the Harlem Renaissance: 50 Years of Afro-American Art” in Pennsylvania. In the Fall Basquiat begins a love affair with Jennifer Goode, an employee of the Area nightclub. In September Bischofberger shows “Collaborations: Basquiat ,Clemente, Warhol”, 15 works at his gallery in Zurich.

During this period Basquiat and Warhol continue working and going out to clubs and parties together. The older artist tries to guide the younger through fame but Basquiats earlier party years have instilled bad habits including serious drug use. February 10 th 1985 Basquiat appears on the cover of The New York Times Magazine in a feature titled "New Art, New Money: The Marketing of an American Artist". He has his Second exhibition at Mary Boone gallery in March. Another sold out show but more mixed reviews. He himself starts to feel as if he is being hyped against his wishes. Henry Geldzahler arranges for Basquiat to paint a mural in newly opened Palladium nightclub. The September Warhol-Basquiat collaborative show at Tony Shafrazi gallery is panned by critics. Basquiat and Warhol break off their friendship as his drug use escalates.

Basquiat makes a trip in November 1986 to Ivory Coast with Jennifer Goode and Bischofberger to attend his show in Abidijan. On return he and Goode split up. Tension builds between he and Mary Boone over the direction of his work. He unsuccessfully joins a drug rehabilitation program, lasting only a week. February 22, 1987, Andy Warhol dies from surgical complications. Though their friendship had ended his former mentors death hits Basquiat hard and he becomes increasingly isolated, his heroin addiction and depression grow more severe. This grieving period inspires two of his best known works the obsessive "Peguses", and his memorial construction "Gravestone".

In April of 1988 he has his first painting show in New York in two years. The show is a hit and is seen as a comeback for the young artist. Riding on this wave of success he returns to Hawai in an attempt to get himself off heroin for good.

August 12, 1988 he's found dead of a heroin overdose in his Great Jones Street studio. He was 27 years old.