Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) - Six Fifty - Artestar licensed print

Jean-Michel Basquiat Lithography (*)
High-quality reproduction of the work “Six Fifty,” created by Basquiat in 1982.
Luxury edition on Monte Carlo high-page-weight watercolor paper (300 g/m2).
Authorized print by Artestar New York.
Copyright of the Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat.

Specifications:

- Support dimensions: 40 x 39 cm
- Ink blot dimensions: 30 x 29 cm
- Condition: Excellent (this work has never been framed or exhibited, and has always been kept in a professional art folder, so it is offered in perfect condition).

The work will be carefully handled and packed in a reinforced flat cardboard package. Shipping will be registered with a tracking number, operated by the leading carriers (UPS DPD DHL FedEx).

The shipment will also include full insurance for the final value of the artwork with full reimbursement in case of loss or damage, at no cost to the buyer.

(*) Jean-Michel Basquiat was the eldest of three children of Matilde Andrades and Gerard Basquiat. His father was a financially solid Haitian accountant and his mother a Puerto Rican graphic designer of great prestige in her profession. Jean-Michel grew up in a torn family environment; his parents divorced and, because of this, he had to change schools many times. He studied at a private Catholic school, later at a public school, and finally, at 16, entered City-As-School, a school for gifted teens, from which he was expelled, in rebellion, a year before graduating.
Already in his youth he came into contact with the urban subculture, related to drug use and street gangs. In 1977, together with Al Diaz, he entered the world of graffiti, painting on subway cars and in the SoHo area, a New York neighborhood where art galleries proliferate.
The following year he left school a year before finishing high school and left home to live for two years on the streets in abandoned buildings or with friends in Lower Manhattan, surviving by selling postcards and T-shirts that he himself decorated. He continued to work on graffiti; his paintings and writings carried a lot of poetic and philosophical content, but above all, satirical. The alias of his shared alter ego with Al Díaz was SAMO (an acronym for “Same Old Shit,” i.e., “the same old crap,” with which they both signed their tags and graffiti with cryptic messages. The use of this name was decisive in his life.
These murals bore inscriptions such as “SAMO saves idiots” or “SAMO ends brainwashing by religion, the politics of nothing, and false philosophy.” An article about SAMO’s street writing published in The Village Voice was the first sign that the art world was taking an interest in him.
The artist had several relationships that influenced his work; one of the most significant was with artist Andy Warhol.
Also, on the romantic side, he dated several women, one of the most well-known today being Madonna. Lower Manhattan was the area where they lived at that time; in 1982 they began to spend more time together and go to parties in galleries. One shared theme, she mentions in an interview: “He was a big fan of Miles Davis and Charlie Parker.”
In 1988 exhibitions were installed in Paris and New York, and in April of that year he tried to overcome his addictions and retreated to his home in Hawaii. He returned to New York in June, announcing that he had freed himself from addictions, but on August 12, 1988, at 27, he died of a heroin overdose, becoming the most successful visual artist in the history of Afro-descendant art. He is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn.
Throughout his brief but intense artistic career he held more than 40 solo exhibitions and participated in around 100 group shows. Self-promotion and advertising claims were priority factors for Basquiat, as they had been for Andy Warhol or Julian Schnabel.
Neo-Expressionism came to dominate over appropriation, partly thanks to the economic strength that raised art prices to high levels, especially painting, and partly thanks to the support of gallerists and collectors. Criticism, however, was not unanimous in its valuation, and there was frequent denunciation of the lack of theoretical basis in neo-expressionist discourse. It was claimed that the art practiced by neo-expressionists lacked any political or social meaning, was merely merchandise and, therefore, subject to the whims and fluctuations of the market. Neo-expressionist painting was reduced to a consumer product and, as such, to a creatively disqualified and vulgar act.