Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) - Sienna - Giclée - 50x45 - Artestar licensed print *COA*

Giclée (*) print of Jean-Michel Basquiat (**)
High-quality reproduction of the work “Sienna,” created by Basquiat in 1984.
Luxury edition on Monte Carlo high-gram watercolor paper (300 g/m2).
Print authorized by Artestar New York.
Copyright of the Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Includes Certificate of Authenticity (COA).

Specifications:

- Support dimensions: 50 x 45 cm
- Stain (print area) dimensions: 40 x 35 cm
- Condition: Excellent (this work has never been framed or exhibited, and has always been kept in a professional art folder, therefore offered in perfect condition).

The work will be carefully handled and packed in a reinforced flat cardboard package. Shipment will be registered with a tracking number, operated by top transport companies (UPS DPD DHL FedEx).

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

(*) Giclée is a term referring to a high-quality fine art printing process, digitally created with inkjet printers. This process uses pigment-based inks and specialized papers to achieve great sharpness, color accuracy, and durability, ideal for art reproductions and photographs.

(**) Jean-Michel Basquiat was the eldest of the three children of Matilde Andrades and Gerard Basquiat. His father was a financially respectable 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, then at a public school and finally, at 16, he enrolled in City-As-School, a school for academically gifted adolescents, from which he was expelled for rebelliousness a year before graduating.
Already in his youth he came into contact with the downtown 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 around the SoHo areas, a New York neighborhood where art galleries proliferate.
The following year he left school one course before graduating from high school and left home to live on the streets for two years, in abandoned buildings or with his friends in Lower Manhattan, surviving by selling postcards and T-shirts that he himself decorated. He continued to work on graffiti; his tags and writings carried a lot of poetic and philosophical charge, but above all satirical. The alias of his shared alter ego with Al Díaz was SAMO (short for “Same Old Shit,” i.e., “the same old crap,” with which they 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 religious brainwashing, the politics of nothingness, and false philosophy.” An article on SAMO’s street writing published in The Village Voice was the first clue 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, in romantic terms, he related to several women, one of the most well-known today being Madonna. Lower Manhattan was the area where they lived at the time; it was in 1982 when they began to spend more time together and go to parties in galleries. A topic that united them, she mentions in an interview: “I 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 leave his addictions and retired to his home in Hawaii. He returned to New York in June, announcing that he had freed himself from the 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 would hold more than 40 solo exhibitions and participate in around 100 group shows. Self-promotion and publicity were priority factors for Basquiat, as they had previously been for Andy Warhol or Julian Schnabel.
Neo-Expressionism came to dominate over appropriationism, partly thanks to the economic strength that raised art prices to high levels, especially painting, and partly thanks to the support of gallery owners and collectors. However, criticism was not unanimous in its assessment, and there was a common critique of the neo-expressionist discourse lacking theoretical foundation. It was claimed that the art practiced by neo-expressionists lacked any political or social meaning, was only merchandise, and therefore subject to the swings and fluctuations of the market. Neo-expressionist painting was reduced to a consumer product and, as such, a creatively disqualified and vulgar act.