HOPE. IS. HERE.
A few days ago, I read a New York Magazine report that art dealer Jeffrey Deitch wants to put a Jean-Michel Basquiat in the White House.
From New York Magazine:
We want to get a great Basquiat painting in the White House,” Deitch said last night at the opening of “Flowers for Baudelaire,” Terence Koh’s new show. “I want to use whatever connections to get a super-outstanding Basquiat in the White House. It could be one of mine. It could be something that a friend owns.”
More: http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2008/11/jeffrey_deitch_wants_a_basquai.html
Take note, in the comments section, that one person recommended Kehinde Wiley.
If we were to remove Basquiat’s quite legendary name, on a more equal level of renown, I think the works of Wiley are more straightforward in their semblance to what Barack Obama represents. His trademark is the portrayal of the African American man in classical painting representations of power–representations traditionally inherited by white men.
A Wiley piece in the White House is homage to that fact. It’s an absolutely fitting homage to the fact that the 44th presidential portrait will, for the first time, be a black man.
That said, it’s inevitable that Obama’s race is going to be a long-term focus for pundits, activists, artists, etc. And it’s from this reason, in my eyes, why a Basquiat would be wonderful at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. A Jean-Michel Basquiat hanging in the White House extends beyond the art or even the artist. Instead, a Basquait is about the fact that he was a member of a New York scene that pulled together a significantly diverse crowd of people to live (often in some definition of poverty and sometimes through squatting) and, simply, create art.
Jean-Michel Basquiat was the ‘seminal graffiti artist turned high art maestro’ of a scene that brought together a rather disparate cross-section of musicians, artists, and various eccentric/creative entities to the rather third-world neighborhoods of New York City in the late 70′s and early 80′s. A viewing of the film Downtown 81 is a testament to the crestfallen environment these artists called home.
The scene brought together No Wave artists like James Chance, Lydia Lunch, Arto Lindsay; hip hop pioneers like Fab Five Freddy and artist ‘Lee’ George Quinones; CBGB types like Debbie Harry; GQ Style Guy Glenn O’Brien; and popular world music like Kid Creole and the Coconuts–amongst an endless level of diversity from various aspects of creativity.
Where else, at this time, could you find a meeting of members of New York’s Hip Hop, Punk, New Wave, and No Wave scenes? These were scenes that, individually, had significant ramifications on cultural diversity, pop culture, and definitions of art that have lasted to this day. Glenn O’Brien’s significantly important–apparently David Letterman’s favorite show at the time btw–TV Party is a good example of this:
A single episode regularly included, alongside O’Brien; Debbie Harry (Blondie), Fab Five Freddy, and Basquiat himself.
That said, Jean-Michel Basquiat is the most noted painter from this period of art. As graffiti artist Samo, he would take the ‘system bombing’ artform of graffiti and use it to question New York City. His mysterious and minimal works escaped definition and often took graffiti to a more intellectually involved exercise that opened one’s environment to the wonderful world of intagibility. As an artist, he blended expressionism (neo-expressionism) with homages to traditional African art.
Although Kehinde Wiley is an extremely talented artist and a pioneer in the representation of blacks in art; consequently being a very good artist for Barack Obama’s White House, Basquiat is a symbol of the diversity and unity that has come to define Barack Obama himself. From the creative flower that grew in the Downtown 81 slums of Manhattan to his art–that hung with large value in SoHo galleries, were discussed in ArtForum, and were once owned by the drummer of Metallica–Basquiat transcends himself and the art itself. In my honest opinion, anything from him would be simply fabulous in the new Obama household.
1981 is real.
//Vladimir Sorokoskev
