The Radiant Child

Last night I watched the documentary on Jean-Michel Basquiat on PBS. I thought it was a very well done movie. It was interesting to me some of the praises that people were saying of Jean-Michel. They were saying he was one of the the best artists this world has seen, and comparing him with other greats like Picasso and Warhol. It was also a pretty sad story about how he really was attacked by the media. It's strange that such a great artist who is said to have such an impact on the world of art wasn't even respected by the art critics of his time.

One of the reasons why he wasn't respected so much seemed to be because of his race. In the 80s many people thought that the issue of race had long since been solved, but we see here that even famous artists like Jean-Michel had to face the harsh realities of race relations in America. Often in articles about him they would be blatantly racist towards him.

Before last weeks presentations, I had never even heard of Basquiat. This is also something that is very weird, considering how great of an artist he was. This may also have to do with race and him not being the typical anglo artist. He was able to not only create beautiful works, but he was able to communicate messages and promote social change in his art. Though someone may look at a painting and think it was just a bunch of random scribbles and lines it all had a deep meaning. I also really liked his ability to take something that an artist did and play off it with his own style. It seems that all greats who are ahead of their time often die young, and that was the case with Jean-Michel. Despite being only 27 when he died, he created over 2,000 works of art.