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Lot Essay
Energized with the spontaneity of Basquiat’s internal world, Untitled (Scoreboard) is created with the same aggression and expression of his monumental works on canvas. Drawn as the artist was about to burst into art world superstardom, this work is distinguishable for its striking vivid colors and rhythmic movement of line and figure–rendered with oilstick in his characteristically gestural style. Combining the language of Abstract Expressionism with the urban figurative landscape, Basquiat was deeply inspired by the work of his predecessors. Untitled (Scoreboard) carries similarities to Arshile Gorky, Henry Matisse, and Cy Twombly, yet unmistakably possesses Basquiat’s unique stream of consciousness. Highly autobiographical, yet with a symbolic twist, Basquiat masters the use of, often unfathomable, marks as seen in the inscriptions along the upper edge and on the scoreboard, as well as a more forceful form of brutish primitivism. “If Cy Twombly and Jean Dubuffet had a baby and gave it up for adoption,” wrote Rene Ricard, “it would be Jean-Michel. The elegance of Twombly is there... and so is the brut of the young Dubuffet” (R. Ricard, ‘The Radiant Child’, in Artforum, December 1981, p. 35).
Basquiat’s desire to work from life in conjunction with his unique form of artistic expression, naturally leads the viewer to try and translate and decipher his meaning. In the same way that he strikes through letters and words, Basquiat’s scoreboard motivates the viewer to spend more time trying to understand the meaning. “I cross out words so you will see them more,” the artist declared, “the fact that they are obscured makes you want to read them” (J-M. Basquiat, “Hollywood Africans, 1983,” Whitney Museum of American Art, 2017). This is true for Basquiat’s score-marks as well–what do each of the numbers and grids denote, what might he be referencing, and what is the game they are playing? The large black form with red, blue, yellow, and black contours extending from it resembles the head of a man, returning to the centrality of the human figure in Basquiat’s smaller works and monumental paintings on canvas. The intense colors and rich lexicon of iconography mirrors his larger paintings, showing the artist’s skill with various mediums and explorations of his deeply expressionistic sensibility. The Twombly-like marks and Picasso-esque Primitivism involves a series of associations through these visible influences. “From Cy Twombly, Basquiat also took license and instruction on how to draw, scribble, write, collage, and paint simultaneously. One of the few art artworks that Basquiat ever cited as an influence was Twombly’s Apollo and the Artist (1975), and its impact is apparent in numerous loose, collaged and scribbled Basquiat works…” (R. Marshall, “Repelling Ghosts,” in R. Marshall, Jean-Michel Basquiat, exh. cat., Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 1993, p. 16).
Considering the usual immensity of Basquiat’s canvases, Untitled (Scoreboard) establishes an intimacy with the viewer, one that is rare, as his paintings do not possess the fascinating incongruity of his aggression with a work on paper. However, in using oilstick, Basquiat is able to transfer the visual and material qualities of paint, the same way he transferred the aesthetic qualities of spray-paint onto canvas. His drawings existed as an important means of expression in their own right and were no less significant to him in relation to his paintings.
Through his thematic focus on social discourse, misunderstanding, and power structures, Basquiat challenges the fundamental constructs of societal systems. Drawing was the most direct form of expression for the artist, acting as the most immediate translation of his inner world–alchemically transforming his gestural impulsivities to cryptic figurations and abstractions. As art historian Jeffrey Hoffeld articulated, “Basquiat’s repeated use of anatomical imagery–skeletons, musculature, and internal organs–coincides with an ever more widespread tendency in his work to turn things inside out. Inner thoughts are made public in graffiti-like litanies of words and other bursts of expression; distinctions between private spaces and public places are dissolved; past and present are interwoven, and levels of reality are multiplied and scrambled; the imagined realms of paradise, hell and purgatory become indistinguishable” (J. Hoffeld, ‘Basquiat and the inner self’”, in Jean-Michel Basquiat, Gemälde und Arbeiten auf Papier (Paintings and works on paper), exh. cat., Museum Würth, Künzelsau, 2001, p. 27).
The complexities of life are converted to a game-like existence, one where the scores are meaningless and the tallies are illegible, becoming more like placeholders rather than real markers of achievement. The internal struggle is translated into a game–the personal becomes public, and as the public, we are challenged to unhinge the complexity, allure, passion, and talent of Basquiat.
Basquiat’s desire to work from life in conjunction with his unique form of artistic expression, naturally leads the viewer to try and translate and decipher his meaning. In the same way that he strikes through letters and words, Basquiat’s scoreboard motivates the viewer to spend more time trying to understand the meaning. “I cross out words so you will see them more,” the artist declared, “the fact that they are obscured makes you want to read them” (J-M. Basquiat, “Hollywood Africans, 1983,” Whitney Museum of American Art, 2017). This is true for Basquiat’s score-marks as well–what do each of the numbers and grids denote, what might he be referencing, and what is the game they are playing? The large black form with red, blue, yellow, and black contours extending from it resembles the head of a man, returning to the centrality of the human figure in Basquiat’s smaller works and monumental paintings on canvas. The intense colors and rich lexicon of iconography mirrors his larger paintings, showing the artist’s skill with various mediums and explorations of his deeply expressionistic sensibility. The Twombly-like marks and Picasso-esque Primitivism involves a series of associations through these visible influences. “From Cy Twombly, Basquiat also took license and instruction on how to draw, scribble, write, collage, and paint simultaneously. One of the few art artworks that Basquiat ever cited as an influence was Twombly’s Apollo and the Artist (1975), and its impact is apparent in numerous loose, collaged and scribbled Basquiat works…” (R. Marshall, “Repelling Ghosts,” in R. Marshall, Jean-Michel Basquiat, exh. cat., Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 1993, p. 16).
Considering the usual immensity of Basquiat’s canvases, Untitled (Scoreboard) establishes an intimacy with the viewer, one that is rare, as his paintings do not possess the fascinating incongruity of his aggression with a work on paper. However, in using oilstick, Basquiat is able to transfer the visual and material qualities of paint, the same way he transferred the aesthetic qualities of spray-paint onto canvas. His drawings existed as an important means of expression in their own right and were no less significant to him in relation to his paintings.
Through his thematic focus on social discourse, misunderstanding, and power structures, Basquiat challenges the fundamental constructs of societal systems. Drawing was the most direct form of expression for the artist, acting as the most immediate translation of his inner world–alchemically transforming his gestural impulsivities to cryptic figurations and abstractions. As art historian Jeffrey Hoffeld articulated, “Basquiat’s repeated use of anatomical imagery–skeletons, musculature, and internal organs–coincides with an ever more widespread tendency in his work to turn things inside out. Inner thoughts are made public in graffiti-like litanies of words and other bursts of expression; distinctions between private spaces and public places are dissolved; past and present are interwoven, and levels of reality are multiplied and scrambled; the imagined realms of paradise, hell and purgatory become indistinguishable” (J. Hoffeld, ‘Basquiat and the inner self’”, in Jean-Michel Basquiat, Gemälde und Arbeiten auf Papier (Paintings and works on paper), exh. cat., Museum Würth, Künzelsau, 2001, p. 27).
The complexities of life are converted to a game-like existence, one where the scores are meaningless and the tallies are illegible, becoming more like placeholders rather than real markers of achievement. The internal struggle is translated into a game–the personal becomes public, and as the public, we are challenged to unhinge the complexity, allure, passion, and talent of Basquiat.