Kangaroo Woman/Sick Souls

The title of this work is derived from the phrase written by Basquiat The Kangaroo woman who makes the rain ... "the kangaroo woman who does the rain is to cleanse the sick souls". In this work the inspiration to the graffiti and the tribal art is more evident than ever: the central face looks like an African mask, the figure below is a shepherd with his sheep (maybe one of the sick souls?) While the his right looks like an African idol.

Basquiat's pop art is much rougher than that of his colleague and friend Warhol, he comes from the street and from there he draws his strength of social denunciation. A subversive scope that the contemporary market, which has sold his works to considerable numbers, has tried in some way to anesthetize. Perhaps this misunderstanding has caused the collapse of the already fragile personality of Basquiat, who dies only 27 years old killed by drugs he had always abused.

The work was printed for the inauguration of the exhibition "Jean Michel Basquiat - Bilder, 1984-1986" at the Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Salzburg, Austria, July-August 1986.

Color offset lithograph. 1984. Printed in 1986. Signed in black marker, lower right. Limited edition.

Jean-Michel Basquiat: biography of the American writer

Born on 22 December 1960 in Brooklyn, New York, Jean-Michel Basquiat was an important American writer and painter. Born to a Haitian father and Puerto Rican mother, he approached the world of art as a child, encouraged by his mother who took him to visit the most important museums in New York such as the Metropolitan Museum, the Museum of Modern Art and the Brooklyn Museum.

Inspired by the cartoons he saw on television, Basquiat began drawing at the age of four. When he was just eight years old, he had a serious accident that forced him to spend a month in hospital. Here, his mother gave him the anatomy textbook Gray's Anatomy by Henry Gray, which influenced him greatly, to the point of inspiring his future artwork in which he drew many anatomical elements. The influence of the anatomy textbook will mark both Basquiat artist and musician; in fact, he will name his first band Gray.

The birth of artist Basquiat occurred in 1977, when at school he met Al Diaz, a young graffiti artist working in Manhattan. Together with Diaz, Basquiat would create an artistic partnership, the two of them starting to produce graffiti on the streets of New York, signing themselves SAMO, or Same Old Shit. However, the partnership would end just three years later, after which Basquiat would write SAMO is dead on the city walls for a while, and after which the SAMO - Basquiat association would no longer take place.

"One night we were smoking weed and I said something about it always being the same old shit, The Same Old Shit. SAMO, right? Imagine: selling packs of SAMO! That's how it started, as a joke between friends, and then it grew." - Jean-Michel Basquiat

After the SAMO - Basquiat parenthesis, works and graffiti will be influenced by the meeting with the king of Pop, Andy Warhol. Jean-Michel Basquiat art entered the famous Factory, Andy Warhol's studio, where he formed a strong bond with Keith Haring. Together with Keith Haring, Basquiat succeeded in bringing American graffiti art from the streets of metropolitan cities to the world's most important art galleries.

In the early 1980s, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Robert Mapplethorpe, Keith Haring, Andy Warhol and Kenny Scharf participated in the retrospective New York/New Wave. In the same year, Basquiat had his first solo exhibition in Modena, Italy.

In spite of the success Basquiat art achieved, graffiti, artwork and international success did not succeed in driving him away from drug addiction, which would lead to his death in 1988, at the age of just 27, due to acute mixed drug intoxication.

Jean-Michel Basquiat: paintings and style

In Jean-Michel Basquiat, paintings and style are strongly influenced by the new commercial advertising language that characterized the 1970s and 1980s in New York. The metropolitan city allowed the young and promising Basquiat to approach the world of Street Art and thanks to the different influences Basquiat was able to create a unique, simple and minimal style.

Jean-Michel Basquiat artwork alternates between the use of lettering, spray cans, symbols and various pictograms, all these techniques create a strong visual impact in Basquiat painting. Strong meaning and denunciation of the injustices African Americans are subjected to is a central theme in his works. Along with the use of pictographs, colorful anthropomorphic figures often appear in Jean-Michel Basquiat's works.

Thanks to his parents' origins in Jean-Michel Basquiat, artworks with a strong African American, African and Aztec influence are mixed together, incorporating the different styles and creating works that still amaze today.

Basquiat - Untitled: the record-breaking work

Sold at auction in 2017 for $110.5 million, Basquiat's artwork Untitled (1982) ranks among the top 10 most expensive works ever auctioned. The Basquiat highest price artwork depicts a skull, composed of black brushstrokes with red, yellow and white rivulets on a blue background. Created in 1982, the artist's most prolific year, it was purchased by Japanese businessman and art collector Yusaku Maezawa.

Thanks to the 2017 auction, Basquiat is considered the youngest artist to have surpassed the $100 million sales threshold; the artist was just 21 years old when he painted Untitled (1982). Moreover, with the sale of the work, Basquiat surpassed the auction record of his mentor Andy Warhol, who had set the auction record at $105 million with Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster).

Basquiat - Crown: the artist's symbol

Having become an undisputed and recognizable symbol of the artist Basquiat, Crown has a very deep meaning. For Jean-Michel Basquiat, crown symbolizes an act of rebellion, as it often appears in paintings in which social and political themes are addressed.

Using the symbol of the crown, Jean-Michel Basquiat challenges the status quo by mocking the recognition he received from international critics. Moreover, he was regarded as the only black artist to have achieved fame in the art market.

However, there are numerous interpretations behind the artist's symbol, such as that anyone can succeed if they put their mind to it or that no matter how much effort someone puts into achieving their goals, a hereditary monarchy will always prevail. Despite the many divergences of meaning in Jean-Michel Basquiat, Crown becomes a unique motif that embodies the artist's wide range of ideas on art, race, politics and fame.

Warhol x Basquiat

Of great importance was the meeting with Andy Warhol that took place in 1983. Since then, numerous works have been realised by the two, thus creating a Warhol x Basquiat partnership that will influence the works of both artists. Four-handedly Basquiat, Warhol created more than one hundred paintings, in which the contribution of both artists is evident. This cycle of works was exhibited in a joint exhibition in which the poster is an emblematic photo of the two artists portrayed as the protagonists of a boxing match, a sport that Basquiat had always been passionate about and that represented such a way of life for the artist that he often compared boxing to the world of art.

In 1984, Andy Warhol, Basquiat and the Italian artist Francesco Clemente started to make six-hand paintings commissioned by Bruno Bischofberger in which each artist painted without knowing what the others were painting.

Basquiat and the mass culture

Although the Basquiat death was premature contributed to the limited creation of works of art, the impact he had on the art market over the years is significant. Today, Basquiat's history and fame are still much discussed and his iconic symbols are taken up in numerous works by international artists. Some of the most important collaborations today include Jean-Michel Basquiat x Bearbrick, in which the artist's features and pictograms are recreated on the best-known art toy.

"Jean-Michel Basquiat lived like a flame. He burned brightly, until the fire went out, but his embers are still smouldering". - Keith Haring

Jean-Michel Basquiat: works for sale with prices and value on Deodato Arte

For those interested in discovering Basquiat's art price and value, Deodato Arte offers a selection of the artist's works for sale online. Don't miss out on Basquiat's paintings, price and value

If you are interested in knowing about Jean-Michel Basquiat's art price prices as well as Basquiat's value or which works will be on display at the Deodato Arte Contemporary Art Gallery, do not hesitate to contact us sending an e-mail to galleria@deodato.com.

The artwork is delicate and will be packed with bubble wrap and rigid supports to protect it from potential damage during transportation. It does not require a wooden box and delivery to EU countries takes 2-5 business days.

For deliveries outside the EU there may be a clearance delay at customs. Contact galleria@deodato.com to receive an estimate of possible customs delays.

The shipping cost is calculated before payment. The cost of packaging is included in the shipping cost.

For more information, please visit our Shipping Methods, Returns and Refunds page.

We are happy that you decided to buy an artwork. We'll explain how to do it, but always remember that you can also buy via email (galleria@deodato.com), by phone (+39 02.80886294) or by physically coming to one of our galleries.

PRICE

If the price is visible in the product fiche you can click "ADD TO CART" and proceed autonomously choosing later how to pay and how you like shipping (or pick-up it in one of our store).

If the price is not visible, you must press the "SHOW PRICE" button, so you will receive an email with the price and a button, "DON'T LOOSE IT, BUY NOW": if the price is right for you click on this button and you will be sent back to the site to complete the purchase.

TAX

if you LIVE IN EU

If you live in Europe (CEE) the price we show you already includes taxes. The works are taxed either with VAT exposed (5%) or VAT with the margin, if you are a private person you do not change anything, if you are a company: in In the first case, you will recover the VAT, in the second, no. When you put the works in the cart you will be separated from the vat exposed.

If you DON'T LIVE IN EU and you want an EXTRA EU shipping

Many works (not all) have an exposed VAT of 5% included in the price, this vat will be spun off! Obviously you will pay the VAT to your destination country, if due. For example if you live in Switzerland you save 5% but you will have to pay 8.1% to your customs, if you live in Hong Kong you will save 5% and you will not have to pay anything to your customs (lucky you).

SHIPPING

Shipments are insured, check the product fiche for more information, or write to galleria@deodato.com. For works in stock the delivery time for Italy is three working days, before placing your order please contact us via email (galleria@deodato.com) or by phone (+39 02.80886294) to check availability. 

PAYMENT

If you complete the purchase on the site you can use a credit card, or you can make a bank transfer. Payment in cash is accepted up to 5,000 euros physically in one of our stores. Payments in BitCoin or cryptocurrencies are NOT accepted.