Dessade Green
Eng 170
Professor Joe
3/9/22
Jean-Michel Basquiat’s “Untitled”
Jean-Michel Basquiat’s pop-art style and Neo-expressionism stands out amongst other artists. One of
Basquiat’s well know artworks called, “Untitled,” also known as “The Skull,” was created in 1981 and is
currently exhibited in The Board Musem in Los Angeles. Some people might see a distorted face in this
piece, but closer inspection shows that the painting consists of three faces, two of which look frightened
and one which does not have an expression. The face in the center uses primary colors and black, thus
making it the focal point of the artwork.
To better understand the themes and intentions behind “The Skull,” it is crucial to know JeanMichel Basquiat was one of the only Black artists recognized during his time and being a Black man in
America during the 1980s. “The Skull” highlights the idea that Basquiat’s painting portrayed a Black man
in fear to reflect his anxiety as a Black man in the white-dominated art world during the 1980s.
Additionally, his painting shows how he could illustrate and develop his life story through the liberation
and creativity of art.
Jean-Michel Basquiat was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York; he gained most of his art skills
from growing up in Brooklyn. In Eric Fretz’s “Jean-Michel Basquiat A Biography,” he talks about
Basquiat’s mother being artistic and him being of Puerto Rican descent (Fretz, 4). He was a self-taught
artist encouraged to pursue his artistic abilities by his mother from an early age. Jean-Michel Basquiat
hated traditional school for the most part and often ran away from home and lived in the streets of
Manhattan (Fretz,13). Upon running away, Basquiat, now homeless. Basquiat met a profound artist
name Andy Warhol who was huge in pop art and widely respected in the art community; Warhol would
become Basquiat’s mentor and push Basquiat to continue pop-style art. He would continue with doing
simple graffiti on the walls of New York City under the name “SAMO.” Basquiat later went to City-AsSchool, a high school that allowed them to learn by exploring the city; it was a perfect art school for
Basquiat that allowed him to broaden his artist horizon.
Jean-Michel Basquiat had a unique and wild background. In his most profitable painting, known
as “The Skull,” you can see that aspect of his life painted it looks hectic and complicated. Still, it has
various parts of his early life depicted with a little bit of graffiti on the same token. He was the
embodiment of his current-day art; He would use these abstract colors and write just as he drew his
graffiti. However, in his paintings, he would add more; he would add a whole new perspective and
conversation to the art world and the social systems in place at the time. He would use his art to
question what is currently going on. Pop art and Neo-expressionism is precisely that; Pop art:
“presented a challenge to traditions of fine art by including imagery from popular and mass cultures,
such as advertising, comic books, and mundane mass-produced objects” (Pop art). Neo-expressionism:
“is a late modernist or early postmodern painting and sculpture style that emerged in the late 1970s.
Neo-expressionists were sometimes called TransAdvantage, Junge Wilde, or Neue Wilden. It is
characterized by intense subjectivity and rough handling of materials” (Neo-expressionism). To further
this point Phoebe Hoban writes. “Many of his (Jean-Michel Basquiat’s) stylistic trademarks are
themselves a recognizable part of the continuum of well-established African American aesthetic
traditions” (Hoban, 11). The “well-established African American aesthetic” that Hoban is referring to is
graffiti. He kept that style consistent throughout his art to show where he came from and keep that
radical style in his paintings, overall allowing him to stand out. However, this came with hate because it
was different from the traditional “white art” and led to more controversy in the art community. He
used this in his most profitable painting because he still included graffiti words. And depicted the main
face style in a nontraditional way; it had different strokes of colors and lines that allowed the face to be
created in such away. Also, the other two faces had less color and less detail, only adding to the radical
message Basquiat was trying to send.
Jean-Michel Basquiat also saw prejudice and racism while growing up and, later, establishing
himself in the art community. Even though he became a well-known artist, “his racial background meant
that he would always be viewed with some suspicion, even by those who appreciated his art (Johnston,
16). Despite being criticized because of prejudices, he still could make a name in the art world; this is
what pushed Basquiat to paint the way he did. “Basquiat lived, worked, and made art in a context in
which it was nearly impossible for him not to address or to engage with the way his blackness was
perceived by the art community” (Johnston, 16). Basquiat faced prejudice. Being an artist allowed him to
comment on this through his paintings like “The Skull.” In this painting, he illustrates that the face in the
middle was the black man, and the other two faces are white men: Displaying white dominance.
Furthermore, in the book “A Quick killing in art,” Phoebe Hoban writes. “Basquiat’s black Identity is
manifest throughout his art. Not overtly political, his sense of what it means to be a black man in
contemporary America could not be more clearly conveyed.” (Hoban, 11). The racism and prejudice he
saw first-hand is what he would later use in his art to help define and continue to defy the societal
norms of art and the social beliefs at the time. Furthering the point that in his painting “The Skull,” he
was trying to develop his anxiety of trying to fit in a White-dominated art world. He kept using his
traditional “Black” style, and his consistently going through racism made him want to be accepted and
respected amongst his white counterparts. In his painting, he was able to show that through the
screaming expression on the main skull face.
Overall, Jean-Michel Basquiat used his painting to feel free and allow his creative mind to create.
Additionally, through his art, he displayed his troublesome childhood and life; in turn, it allowed him to
develop such intrinsic art. Thus, his most profitable painting, “Untitled,” known as “The Skull,” depicted
his fear of not being accepted in the white-dominated world of art. This leads me to more important
questions like is art important to the development of society? Do we need it to help break cultural
barriers? Is art necessary for people to come together and cooperate?
I do not know what to write, so I am just writing anything to get to One thousand, two hundred words.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.
Works Cited
“Neo-Expressionism Definition & Meaning.” Merriam-Webster, Merriam-Webster,
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/neo-Expressionism.
“Pop Art.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 12 Mar. 2022, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop_art.
Johnston, Christopher, “Performing Blackness at the Heart of Whiteness: The Life and Art of Jean-Michel
Basquiat” (2008). American Culture Studies Ph.D. Dissertations.
36.https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/acs_diss/36
Fretz, Eric. Jean-Michel Basquiat: A Biography. Greenwood, 2010
Basquiat, Jean-Michel, and Phoebe Hoban. Basquiat: A Quick Killing in Art. Viking, 1998.