Reading Basquiat: Exploring Ambivalence in American ArtBefore his death at the age of twenty-seven, Jean-Michel Basquiat completed nearly 2,000 works. These unique compositionsÑcollages of text and gestural painting across a variety of mediaÑquickly made Basquiat one of the most important and widely known artists of the 1980s. Reading Basquiat provides a new approach to understanding the range and impact of this artistÕs practice, as well as its complex relationship to several key artistic and ideological debates of the late twentieth century, including the instability of identity, the role of appropriation, and the boundaries of expressionism. Jordana Moore Saggese argues that Basquiat, once known as Òthe black Picasso,Ó probes not only the boundaries of blackness but also the boundaries of American art. Weaving together the artistÕs interests in painting, writing, and music, this groundbreaking book expands the parameters of aesthetic discourse to consider the parallels Basquiat found among these disciplines in his exploration of the production of meaning. Most important, Reading Basquiat traces the ways in which Basquiat constructed large parts of his identityÑas a black man, as a musician, as a painter, and as a writerÑvia the manipulation of texts in his own library. |
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aesthetic African American artists African diaspora Andy Warhol appears appropriation argued art history art world Basquiat's paintings Beat bebop black artists BLACK PICASSO Brooklyn Burroughs canvas catalog chapter Charlie Parker collage composition concept connection contemporary copy CREATIVITY FOUND critics culture Cy Twombly Deitch Dizzy Gillespie essay Èsù-Elégbára European example exhibition EXPRESSIONISM Fab 5 Freddy figure Gallery graffiti Gysin Haitian hip-hop historian Ibid identity improvisation included interview Jack Kerouac jazz Jean-Michel Basquiat LANGUAGE OF EXPRESSIONISM Leonardo Ligon Mary Boone Michael Holman Miles Davis modern modernist Mona Lisa Museum of Art musicians Negro NOTES TO PAGES original òrìsà painter paintings and drawings panel photographic phrase PLAID PLAID plate portrait Rauschenberg references relationship reproduced Richard Marshall Robert Farris Thompson Romare Bearden Santería scholars signified spontaneity style Suzanne Mallouk symbols Tamra Davis technique tion tradition University Press Untitled visual arts Vodou words writing Yoruba