American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) quickly became one of art history s most luminescent personalities; his friendships with Andy Warhol, Keith Haring, and Madonna, as well as his tragic death at the age of twenty-seven, are the stuff of legend. This retrospective publication traces the artist s unique career and pinpoints his important position in art history. Basquiat s works are marked by the kind of intensity and energy that also determined the course of his brief life. In just eight years-comparable to the career of Egon Schiele-Basquiat not only managed to create an extensive oeuvre, but also to establish new figurative and expressive elements alongside Conceptual and Minimal Art. At the age of twenty-one, he became the youngest artist ever to be invited to the documenta, while his work also anticipated that of Germany s Junge Wilde movement and the art of the nineties. (German edition ISBN 978-3-7757-2592-7)
Exhibition schedulde: Fondation Beyeler, Riehen/Basel, May 9-September 5, 2010
