Jean-Michel-Basquiat Untitled 1981 oil and wax crayon on paper 61 x 45.4 cm (24 x 17 7/8 in.) Signed and dated '81 JeanMB' on a label affixed to the reverse.
Provenance The artist Galerie Bischofberger, Zurich Akira Ikeda Gallery, Japan Private Collection, Japan Exhibited Nagoya, Akira Ikeda Gallery, Drawings, March 1988 Catalogue Essay “ Believe it or not, I can actually draw.” - Jean-Michel-Basquiat Executed in 1981, Untitled, concisely encapsulates the vivacity and excitement of the early foundation of Jean-Michel-Basquiat’s oeuvre. While works on paper traditionally insinuate complementary works to the opus of the artist in an art historical context, it can be argued that the present lot on paper matches the visceral, active spirit of his canvas works: “Drawing was an essential element in the art of Jean-Michel-Basquiat. The artist made no hierarchical distinction between drawing and painting, and in fact, his paintings and drawings are often indistinguishable, and only differ in their paper or canvas support”, (Richard D. Marshall as quoted in Enrico Navarra, ed., Jean-Michel-Basquiat: Oeuvres sur Papier, Paris, 1999, p.30). With a self-assured hand constructing the surface, Untitled charismatically exhibits Basquiat’s exemplary painterly aesthetic of securing the pictorial tension in his works on paper. In the present lot, Basquiat delimits the picture plane into subtitles and sub-frames. A smaller display of the artist’s oeuvre, the work on paper contains iconic, characteristic emblems associated with Basquiat’s early drawings: radiant yellow circles and a yellow crown hover above the scratchily coloured-in car, while the foundation of the drawing is comprised of a combination of the letters ‘A’ and ‘O’ that are randomly boxed. The contents are framed by loose, yet concise bold red lines; however, the phrase, “Before World War II less than a third owned their own dogs or hot water”, is exempt from the premeditated pictorial boundaries. The idiom is a fantastic example of Basquiat’s experiment in semiotics with his own hermeneutical devices, also known as SAMO, which was comprised of abridged sentences that once adorned the Brooklyn Bridge early in the artist’s career. Despite its simple, childlike images of the subject and the conspicuous randomness of the lines and etchiness of the letters, the drawing retains a refined cautiousness with its exquisite symbolic renderings. Fusing the rough urbanism of his street graffiti with his fresh and expressive raw symbolism, the present lot discerns a complex assemblage of spontaneous jargon that helped launch Basquiat’s aesthetic vernacular into the language of the 20th century. Read More
Jean-Michel-Basquiat Untitled 1981 oil and wax crayon on paper 61 x 45.4 cm (24 x 17 7/8 in.) Signed and dated '81 JeanMB' on a label affixed to the reverse.
Provenance The artist Galerie Bischofberger, Zurich Akira Ikeda Gallery, Japan Private Collection, Japan Exhibited Nagoya, Akira Ikeda Gallery, Drawings, March 1988 Catalogue Essay “ Believe it or not, I can actually draw.” - Jean-Michel-Basquiat Executed in 1981, Untitled, concisely encapsulates the vivacity and excitement of the early foundation of Jean-Michel-Basquiat’s oeuvre. While works on paper traditionally insinuate complementary works to the opus of the artist in an art historical context, it can be argued that the present lot on paper matches the visceral, active spirit of his canvas works: “Drawing was an essential element in the art of Jean-Michel-Basquiat. The artist made no hierarchical distinction between drawing and painting, and in fact, his paintings and drawings are often indistinguishable, and only differ in their paper or canvas support”, (Richard D. Marshall as quoted in Enrico Navarra, ed., Jean-Michel-Basquiat: Oeuvres sur Papier, Paris, 1999, p.30). With a self-assured hand constructing the surface, Untitled charismatically exhibits Basquiat’s exemplary painterly aesthetic of securing the pictorial tension in his works on paper. In the present lot, Basquiat delimits the picture plane into subtitles and sub-frames. A smaller display of the artist’s oeuvre, the work on paper contains iconic, characteristic emblems associated with Basquiat’s early drawings: radiant yellow circles and a yellow crown hover above the scratchily coloured-in car, while the foundation of the drawing is comprised of a combination of the letters ‘A’ and ‘O’ that are randomly boxed. The contents are framed by loose, yet concise bold red lines; however, the phrase, “Before World War II less than a third owned their own dogs or hot water”, is exempt from the premeditated pictorial boundaries. The idiom is a fantastic example of Basquiat’s experiment in semiotics with his own hermeneutical devices, also known as SAMO, which was comprised of abridged sentences that once adorned the Brooklyn Bridge early in the artist’s career. Despite its simple, childlike images of the subject and the conspicuous randomness of the lines and etchiness of the letters, the drawing retains a refined cautiousness with its exquisite symbolic renderings. Fusing the rough urbanism of his street graffiti with his fresh and expressive raw symbolism, the present lot discerns a complex assemblage of spontaneous jargon that helped launch Basquiat’s aesthetic vernacular into the language of the 20th century. Read More
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
