Basquiat exhibition coming to Brooklyn Museum

Art by legendary painter and NYC icon Jean-Michel Basquiat will be on display in his Brooklyn birthplace at the Brooklyn Museum. The exhibition of his 1982 painting Untitled runs from January 26 to March 11. Here’s more info:

The Brooklyn Museum is proud to present the first museum exhibition of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Untitled. Created in 1982, a breakout year in Basquiat’s meteoric career, Untitled is emblematic of his early success and ranks among the artist’s most powerful paintings. One Basquiat is just the latest of many links between the artist and the borough— from his birth at Brooklyn Hospital, to childhood visits to the Brooklyn Museum, where his mother enrolled him as a Junior Member when he was six years old, to the Museum’s retrospective Basquiat in 2005 and its critically acclaimed presentation Basquiat: The Unknown Notebooks in 2015.

One Basquiat and surrounding public programming have been made possible by collector Yusaku Maezawa. Commenting on the exhibition, Mr. Maezawa said, “I am thrilled to be sending Basquiat’s masterpiece home to Brooklyn. It is my hope that through the exhibition and extensive programming accompanying it, the young people of the borough will be inspired by their local hero, just as he has inspired so many of us around the world.” Following a world tour, Untitled will eventually be housed in a museum that Mr. Maezawa is building in his hometown of Chiba, Japan.

One Basquiat is organized by Eugenie Tsai, John and Barbara Vogelstein Senior Curator of Contemporary Art.

Anne Pasternak, the Brooklyn Museum’s Shelby White and Leon Levy Director, noted, “We are extremely grateful for Mr. Maezawa’s generosity and for this tremendous opportunity to present this stunning painting in Basquiat’s hometown. One Basquiat is the continuation of a relationship the Museum has had with the life and art of Jean-Michel Basquiat, from his early visits as a child to our recent exhibitions.”

Additionally, museum curator Eugenie Tsai said of Untitled:

In the single decade of Basquiat’s artistic career, he went from spray-painting witty, cryptic aphorisms on the street to being an international art star whose paintings were highly coveted by collectors. The simplicity of Untitled‘s composition and the raw energy of the brushwork and drawn lines create an iconic painting that represents Basquiat at his artistic height.

The One Basquiat exhibition “is a prelude to an upcoming series of spotlight presentations, each of which will feature a single work of art from the Museum’s encyclopedic collection.” You can see the schedule for those presentations below and get more info at the Brooklyn Museum website.

Brooklyn Museum will also be presenting an exhibit on David Bowie (whose personal art collection included works by Basquiat and who played Andy Warhol in the Basquiat movie), David Bowie is, in March.

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Target First Saturday: Black History Month
Saturday, February 3, 5-11 pm
Museum-wide
Free
February’s Target First Saturday celebrates Black History Month with an evening of music, storytelling, scholarship, dance, film, and literature. At 6 pm, join curator Eugenie Tsai as she leads a talk in One Basquiat.

Brooklyn Talks: “A Tribute to Basquiat”
Thursday, February 15, 7 pm
Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Auditorium, 3rd Floor
Tickets start at $20 and include Museum admission.

Contemporary artists speak on one artwork by Jean-Michel Basquiat that has inspired them and their practice. Afterward, the participants come together for a conversation on Basquiat’s legacy. Participants include graffiti artist and Creative Director of Def Jam Cey Adams and photographer Maripol, among others.

Little Cinema Presents Basquiat
Thursday, March 8, 7 pm
Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Auditorium, 3rd Floor
Tickets are $16 and include Museum admission.

Little Cinema presents an immersive screening of Basquiat (Julian Schnabel, 1996, 108 min.) layered with live theatrical performances. Founded by audio-visual artist CHNNLS (Jay Rinsky), with the support and partnership of House of Yes, the Little Cinema series blends cinema and live performance. The program has adult content and is recommended for adult audiences.