Wonderful article. I have yet to see the show, but I will.

On a side note, I think the Schnabel movie sucked ass. Who was Basquiat? Why did he take drugs? What was up with him and his father? Why did the filmaker think it was cute that he (Basquiat) was homeless at the beginning of the film?
His self-destructive path was romantcised and exploited in that Sid and Nancy way that I don't find funny. You should check it out though you may not see what I saw.

this show is hot (and so is the review). everybody should check it out!

I will still check out the show and yes, I'm glad to see an article like this on New York Indymedia.

If you see the movie I would like the author to write a review of the film and maybe (if possible)contrast or compare the movie with the works of the show.

A much more interesting movie than schnabel's mess would be "Downtown 81" which is a fictional/documentary account of a character played by Basquiat himself:

 http://www.downtown81.com/synop.htm

Movie has cameos by DNA + Blondie and was made by Glenn O'Brien, who had a popular NY cable access show called TV Party.

Yes, Downtown 81 was very telling of who JMB was to an extent and the ending was poetic. I thought it was cool.
Wright was good in Julian's film, though.

Excellent article!!

Thanks

Great review, Kazembe! Definitely have to see this show.

actually, i thought the schnabel movie avoided many of the pitfalls of the "tragic genius" film genre. it was more impressionistic than a clear narrative, and the racism directed towards basquiat was presented in subtle ways. it's more of an idea of basquiat than an attempt to speak about him definitively. i love jeff wright in this (his first film!) and the metaphor at the end of the little prince locked away in a tower and him banging his crown against the bars made such a beautiful sound.

i've seen downtown 81 as well. it was fascinating to get a look at the east village back in the day before starbucks and urban outfitters. basquiat strides past abandoned lots full of rubble and various bowery characters.

i saw the show last week, and the canvases are striking, but to call jmb a 'great' painter is a stretch. he was a bold colorist and great self-promoter, little more. his success is an indication of the canny commodification of blackness and of graf by himself and his dealers, not a measure of his abilities. he was a one-trick pony, getting stoned and mining big reference books for vaguely cohesive symbolism, cray-pa in hand. there are only two or three canvases up in the show that represent novel creative expression; the rest are regurgitations, giving the public what they had come to expect.

You call this art? Five year old kids can do better! Big deal!

to the posters that think basquiat was over-rated, i would read a little art history and art criticism before making such a comment. if you think his work is childish, where does that leave pollack, or the work of the dadaists?
just because you do not understand something doesnt mean it has no value. spend more than a few seconds looking at basquiats work and the plethora of meaning is plain to see. his work presaged today's internet and sampling craze, and he truly stands as one of the best artists ever.

rodrigo,

i don't get my aesthetic sensibilities out of a textbook. i happen to think pollock was the greatest charlatan in the history of art-- boone and bischofberger certainly took a few pages out of clem greenberg's playbook in promoting jmb.

as for the dadaists, you misunderstand their significance-- the simplicity, banality, and nonsense of their work constituted an attack on the institutions which place art apart from life and put certain creators on pedestals. these are precisely the institutions jmb was able to manipulate for his advancement.

as influences go, i'd say jmb owes a lot more to de kooning than either pollock or the dadaists.

and sampling goes back at least as far as the 1950s when composers like tod dockstader were using found sounds in their work.

oh, and for all the street cred he gets from the art establishment, his handskills with a spraycan were weak indeed.

the only thing that i think is worthwhile critiquing basquiat is really about the whole return to painting of the neo-expressionists of the 80's. it was in many respects a backlash against conceptual art, body art, performance art -- which had dominated the art field from the late 60's thru the 70's. That work was decidedly anti-capitalist, in that there were little to no commodities to trade. The rise of neo-expressionist stuff, which along with Basquiat had other folks working in brash color palettes and 'crude', expressionist gestures (germans like Baselitz, etc.) was in many ways neo-conservative.

Schnabel is a great example, what with all his sentimental schlock. It is no wonder that much of this work is not shown all that much these days.

It lacks ideas, first and foremost much critical analysis/self-reflexion on how the Work itself (as an artist taking responsibility for the work -- an important idea in conceptual and minimalist work), is a part of the commodity flow (or not) of "Art".

And then how to create works which don't just fall right in step with the Commodity.

Basquiat, like others, was a part of this forget-conceptual-art-make-big-paintings scene. 'Enjoying' it for all it was worth (big money, magazine covers -- and not just art niche magazine or journals)...

Now, as to whether his work, was in important ways different then the greater bulk of this flashy 'movement' is another story.

I think he was doing perhaps the most interesting work in the whole neo-expressionist framework.

In some ways, he rode that, for what it was worth as well.