basquiat showcase

22
Volume 1 - Issue 1

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Welcome to the very first issue of the dublu. showcase. This first issue will be dedicated to the heart and soul of Jean-Michel Basquiat.

TRANSCRIPT

Volu

me 1

- Issu

e 1

“I don't think about art when I'm working.I try to think about life.”

SAMOtheradiant

Jean-Michel began as an obscure gra!ti artist in New York Cityin the late 1970s and evolved into an acclaimed Neo-expressionistand Primitivist painter by the 1980s.

Jean-Michel Basquiat22/12/1960 - 12/8/1988

"roughout his career Basquiat focused on "suggestive dichotomies,"such as wealth versus poverty, integration versus segregation, andinner versus outer experience. Basquiat's art utilized a synergy ofappropriation, poetry, drawing and painting, which married text andimage, abstraction and #guration, and historical information mixedwith contemporary critique. Utilizing social commentary as a"springboard to deeper truths about the individual", Basquiat'spaintings also attacked power structures and systems of racism,while his poetics were acutely political and direct in their criticismof colonialism and support for class struggle.

child

In 1976, Basquiat and friend Al Diaz began spray-paintinggra!ti on buildings in Lower Manhattan, working under thepseudonym SAMO. "e designs featured inscribed messagessuch as "Plush safe he think.. SAMO" and "SAMO as anescape clause." On December 11, 1978, the Village Voicepublished an article about the gra!ti.

When Basquiat & Diaz ended their friendship, "e SAMOproject ended with the epitaph "SAMO IS DEAD," inscribedon the walls of SoHo buildings in 1979.

In 1979 although not being able to actually play aninstrument, Jean-Michel, along with close friends starteda band. Performing under the name “Test Pattern” whichwould later be re-named “Gray” they played a seeminglydisfunctional / experimental style of music that becamequite popular in the 1980’s known as “noise rock”. !isstyle of music was developed o" the back of the punk/rockgenre which focussed on more obscure sounds and pridesitself on stearing away from the traditional structure ofsong writting.

BASQUIATWARHOL

COLAB

In 1980 Basquiat met Andy Warhol in a restaurant. Basquiat approachedWarhol and presented him with some samples of his work. Warhol wasstunned by Basquait's genius and allure. !e two men went onto becomegood friends and in turn sharing the same love for art, they descided tocollaborate on numerous peices. !ier two completely di"erent styles havemade for some of the most amazing and memorable artworks created to date.

"Basquiat had an innate capacity to functionas something like an oracle,

distilling his perceptions of the outsideworld down to their essence and,in turn, projecting them outward

through his creative acts."

Fred Ho!man.

Darker Days...

Darker Days... Along with Basquiat’s amazing brilliance there was a parallelled darknessthat would torment him throughout his years and would sadly be the reasonfor his life coming to an early end. Struggling with a drug addiction, despitean attempt at sobriety during a trip to Maui, Hawaii. On August 12th 1988

overdosed with heroin. He was only 27.

SAMO