Modernism, as discussed in a prior post, "sought a new alignment with the experience and values of modern industrial life" but, by the middle of the 20th century, "modern life" had been disrupted (The Art Story):
- The world had experienced two world wars with millions of lives lost
- Nuclear weapons had been used
- Communist ideals had been shattered, partly by its own weight and partly by a re-invigorated post-war capitalism.
Societal changes had been accompanied by changes in the art world: The center of avant-garde painting had shifted from Europe to NYC and Abstract Expressionism, and its practitioners, were flourishing.
It was at this point that the first cracks begun to appear in the modernist superstructure as young artists began to question the relevance of the art for the times as well as the perch occupied by the feted artists. Artists like Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg began to experiment with new styles that borrowed and recreated imagery from the mass culture that surrounded them. This was the beginning of the neo-Dada movement -- "the first of the genuinely postmodern movements" -- which would itself give rise to other postmodern movements such as POP Art and Minimalism.
The chart immediately below captures the main postmodernist movements while the two images following show works created by Johns and Rauschenberg during the neo-Dada period.
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| Monogram, 1955 - 1959 Robert Rauschenberg |
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| White Flag, 1955 Jasper Johns |
If neo-Dada is the first of the postmodern movements, what exactly is postmodernism. According to MOMA, it is a reaction against modernism, "less a cohesive movement than an approach and attitude toward art, culture and society" whose main characteristics include:
- Anti-authoritarianism
- Collapsing of the distinction between high culture and mass or popular culture
- Collapsing of the distinction between art and everyday life
- A deliberate use of earlier styles and conventions
- An eclectic mixing of different artistic and popular styles and media.
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| Marilyn Diptych, 1962 Andy Warhol |
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| The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, 1991 Damien Hirst |
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| Untitled, c. 1996 Jamali |
... merely a trendy fashion statement, a bleep on the radar ... The Abstract Expressionists came together to promote a cause, while the East Village artists came together to promote themselves.
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| Jean-Michel Basquiat By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=29602496 |
Jean-Michel dropped out of school prior to graduation and fell into the graffiti culture which was then taking off in Brooklyn and the Bronx. He tagged with a fellow artist under the moniker Samo© but when they fell out, he killed off the designation.
New York City was falling apart at this time. It was deep in debt and awash in deserted and abandoned buildings. The cheap rent attracted artists to the Lower East Side and this mish mosh of practitioners from all branches of the arts yielded a unique, gritty culture. Basquiat fell right into this, steering away from graffiti and wanting to be considered an artist.
During this time he could not afford art supplies so he painted on anything that was available -- scraps of paper, doors from abandoned buildings, etc. His artistic skills began to be noticed but his sprint to the top really began with his participation in the January 1981 art show at PS1 in Queens that was organized by Diego Cortez. Basquiat's path to stardom post that meeting is shown in the chart below.
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.
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| Untitled (Word on Wood), 1985 Jean-Michel Basquiat |
Yellow Door 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.
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| Yellow Door (1960), 1985 Jean-Michel Basquiat |
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| Untitled (Self-Portrait), 1982 Oilstick and ink on paper |
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| Untitled (Man with Microphone), 1982 Oilstick on paperboard |
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| Per Capita, 1981 Acrylic and oilstick on canvas |
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| Arroz con Pollo, 1981 Acrylic and oilstick on canvas |
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| Warrior, 1982 Acrylic and oilstick on wood panel |
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| Untitled, 1982 Acrylic, oilstick, and spray paint on wood |
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| Untitled, 1982 Acrylic, oilstick, and spray paint on wood |
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| Untitled, 1981 Acrylic and oilstick on canvas |
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| Untitled (tenant), 1982 Acrylic and oilstick on canvas |
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| Self-Portrait with Suzanne, 1982 Oilstick on paperboard |
His color-drenched canvasses are peopled with primitive figures wearing menacing, masklike faces, painted against fields jammed with arrows, grids, crowns, skyscrapers, rockets and words ... His drawings and paintings are edgy and raw, yet they resonate with the knowledge of such modern masters as Dubuffet, Cy Twombly or even Jasper Johns.Table 1. Characterizing Basquiat's talent
| Name | Profession | Assessment |
| Sandro Chia (after the PS1 show) | Painter (Italian) | “Basquiat’s paintings captured the spontaneity of the City” “The paintings were full of disparate elements that somehow worked together though there was no apparent system linking them” |
| John Russell | Chief art critic, New York Times | “Basquiat proceeds by disjunction — that is by making marks that seem quite unrelated, but that turn out to get on very well together” |
| Vivian Raynor | New York Times Writer | “The educated quality of Basquiat’s line and the stateliness of his compositions both of which bespeak a formal training that, in fact, he never had.” |
Jean-Michel Basquiat died of an overdose in 1988. He was 28 years old.
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