Bassquiat and Purvis Young at Tampa Museum of Art: Ordinary/Extraordinary Assemblage in Three Acts

Contrary to the museum's protestations to the contrary, the juxtaposition between the lives and art of the black American artists Jean-Michel Basquiat and Purvis Young is thrown into sharp relief in exhibits of their work at Tampa Museum of Art. The two discrete shows (Jean Michel Masquiat: One Master Artist/Two Masterpieces and Purvis Young: 91) are part of an exhibition series titled Ordinary/Extraordinary Assemblage in Three Acts; the third show in the series is titled Sacred Diagrams: Haitian Vodou Flags from the Gessen Collection.

Each of the foregoing can be viewed as a separate show but, according to the museum, are linked by

... the use of found objects, such as discarded wood and repurposed textiles ... More importantly, historical and socio-economic narratives informed by the Afro-Caribbean Diaspora, the black experience in America, as well as European artistic influences unite the artists featured in the series.

I will focus on the Basquiat and Young shows in this post.

This is the second exhibition of both artists works that I have attended this year -- Basquiat at the Brant and Young at the Deland Museum of Art -- and I am struck by more of the contrasts than the commonalities between the two artists. The chart below is illustrative.

The way that the individual shows are exhibited also provides a juxtaposition, with two Basquiat originals emplaced on a wall, with significant white space around each piece, and, in the next room, separated by a perpendicular wall, the cacaphony of the Young exhibition.

The first of the two Basquiat paintings (Untitled (Word on Wood)) is one of 17 Basquiat paintings that incorporates wood fence slats. The slats are painted black and divided into two unequal hemispheres. The upper hemisphere is dominated by a blue square with a gold border which serves as a frame for an African-mask-like structure with mismatched oval eyes and bared teeth. A line runs from a distinctly negroid nose through a unibrow to the top of the forehead, dividing the forehead into two unequally adorned hemispheres. The top of the head is festooned with light-brown, cornrow-type structures.

The lower hemisphere is populated by some of the markings for which Basquiat is known. The left, chair-like structure is brown in color and associated with a white comb marking while the right leg is entwined by a green vine and is adjacent to an upturned comb.

Untitled (Word on Wood), 1985
Jean-Michel Basquiat

The second painting is a collage of different textured items emplaced on a bright-yellow, two-hemisphere, wooden door. The Spanish word for miracle is repeated a number of times on the structure's upper hemisphere.

Yellow Door (1960), 1985
Jean-Michel Basquiat

As you walk around the dividing wall, you are suddenly confronted with the cacaphony of the Young series. The 91 paintings, the totality of the museum's Purvis Young collection, are hung shoulder-to-shoulder from floor to ceiling in honor of the author's "magnum opus:"

For a short period of time in the 1970s, Young installed his paintings from the ground to the rooftops of abandoned storefronts in his neighborhood. The Wall of Respect in Chicago, a mural that featured heroic black men and women painted at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, influenced Young. He aimed to replicate the Wall of Respect in Overtown with his powerful, provocative paintings and often overlapped the paintings in an extreme salon-style hang. Titled Goodbread Alley Mural, the project was on view from approximately 1971-74 until the City of Miami started to dismantle the artwork. The installation on view in this gallery takes inspiration from the Goodbread Alley Mural ...

I found this layout jarring: I was not sure whether I should evaluate it as a mural or evaluate each piece on its own. In general I find Young's work slightly claustrophobic -- due to the object density on his pieces -- and that feeling was on steroids with so many of his pieces stacked together. Museums are requesting that patrons spend more time evaluating paintings on view: I do not believe that this layout advanced that objective.

It is not obvious how the Vodou Flags exhibit fits in with the works of these two well-known artists.

©EverythingElse238