I dunno

Another victory of style over substance.

Crap.

Gramsci wrote:Another victory of style over substance.

Crap.

I hear Basquiat was on substance for most of his silly Warhol-sucking life.

I'll go one step further than CRAP and call BULLSHIT. His work is only superficially interesting and the mythologising surrounding him only adds to its craptitude. What would he have been without the patronage of Andy Warhol?

Am I missing something in his work?

How refreshing to hear this stuff slagged off. He is worshipped by art students. Is it because it was the first attempt at appropriating modern 'street-style' art?

Well it does nout for me.

crap.

I know it seems like pure bullshit. And the self-mythologizing, Warhol patronage and embarrassing 'energy in the streets of NYC' is a lot to swallow but I saw some of his paintings in an exhibition a few years ago and I thought they were really okay. I'm totally removed from the 'art world' so I've no idea what his reputation is these days or what people think of him - I can see why he's an easy figure to romanticize (or equally loathe with vigour) but all that aside I quite liked his paintings.

Overall I'm going with crap but with a surprising amount of waffles.

I don't care of you!

Yes, seeing his paintings in person may change your mind about his work.

I saw a bunch of them earlier this year and I have to vote N/C.

cjh wrote: I saw some of his paintings in an exhibition a few years ago and I thought they were really okay. I'm totally removed from the 'art world' so I've no idea what his reputation is these days or what people think of him

I think that's the best way to approach any work. If it speaks to you then it's working.

Angus Young wrote:Yes, seeing his paintings in person may change your mind about his work.

I agree. They're definitley vibrant and confidently large, without being boastful--very physical and hard to ignore. Much like Rock 'n' Roll. They're worked onto with a lot of satisfying intensity and vigour. Which is all very apparent when you confront them in the flesh.

I like the skull-head-robot things.

Surprisingly, Not Crap.

I think Basquiat's paintings are fucking great. No reservation, no waffle. There is plenty of substance in his work. Vibrant, solid, both plain and intricate, accessible without being easy, violent yet playful, urban and urbane, even unique. Being patroned, as it were, by Warhol is hardly a strike against one's art. Warhol was fucking incredible, though that probably belongs on another ill-conceived c/nc thread.

I think his paintings, as paintings, are quite interesting to look at. His drawings are much more interesting than the paintings.

Not Crap.

However, I think after his death art critics/scholars dug for meaning and subtext in his work that I think just isn't there. I honestly don't think in 90% of his work that Basquiat is "upholding the griot tradition" or "expressing the pain of his Haitian roots" like the people who write walltexts would have you believe. So those guys are Crap.

Earlier this year I took part in an art outreach program in Newark, New Jersey. Five high school art classes (a different one each day, for four weeks) from the worst schools in the Tri-State area (and perhaps the US) were taken to a variety of museums and galleries to show these kids (mostly poor and black) that art was

- not always "pretty"
- not made exclusively by white men
- not always made by people with training
- not always high-concept

All the classes were taken to the Basquiat show, which at that point was at the Brooklyn Museum. All of the kids had a strong reaction to it, which to me meant that Basquiat's art wasn't all crap. Not all of them liked it, but they all reacted to it. Which, in the end, is what I was taught art was supposed to do. These kids couldn't care less about subtext.

I think what captured their attention the most was the fact that he had started as a tagger.

Fun Facts: Basquiat is in Blondie's "Rapture" video, playing turntables. Not Crap.

Basquiat was in a band with Vincent Gallo, called Grey. The band: Not Crap. Allowing one's self to stand in such close proximity to Vincent Gallo: Crap.

Basquiat was called, often to his face, "Jean-Michel Basketcase" by my pal Jim.