Reviews (1)

Amazing Quality
I highly recommend this book.The print quality and color of the images is top notch.And there's a ton of great info as well.There's no reason not to get this if you're interested in Jean-Michel at all. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. 20th Century Art    2. Art    3. Art & Art Instruction    4. Basquiat, Jean Michel.    5. Exhibitions    6. History - Contemporary (1945- )    7. Individual Artist    8. Popular Culture - General    9. Art / Individual Artist    10. Individual artists   

Editorial Review

This minutely reported book is as much a portrait of the frenzied, prodigal New York art world of the 1980s as it is a biography of Jean-Michel Basquiat, who died of a drug overdose at age 27 in 1988. Basquiat, one of very few African American artists to acquire an international reputation, left a thick web of dealers, collectors, friends, lovers, paintings, drawings, and used syringes behind him. Author Phoebe Hoban seems to have unblinkingly interviewed or examined them all. While she duly registers Basquiat's sad childhood, with his unstable Puerto Rican mother and punishing Haitian father, she doesn't make much of the deeper veins of sorrow and self-destruction that may have motivated the artist and informed his art.Rather, she allows his celebrity, which whisked him from street urchin to art star, to be the central trajectory of this story. The Warhol protégé would probably approve, as he was the primary obliterator of his own psychological depths, throwing away his short, phenomenally productive life in the edgy club and drug scene of downtown Manhattan. The miracle is that Basquiat was so good, and so serious, an artist, surrounded as he was by hype and cash. Hoban's book is a fluid, intricate, authoritative dissection of a time, a place, and--almost--a person. Read more

Reviews (21)

Most useful for history buffs, not terribly enlightening for fans of Basquiat's work
Phoebe Hoban's BASQUIAT: A Quick Killing in Art is one of the few biographies of the painter whose brief career (1980-1988) coincided with the disgusting obsession with profit of the Eighties' art world. There is little here about his work itself, and in order to understand why Basquiat is so important you'll need a collection of his pictures.
Reality Check
I usually am disappointed in the art books I purchase because they lack insight into the artist and the reproductions are consistently not accurate reproductions.
Contains just a peek into the life of Basquiat
I enjoyed this book. It is a pretty entertaining read,but it does not got that in depth into the artists life.It does give some insight into the man and his work, but not as much as I would like.Still worth a look for any fan of Basquiat, though. 3 1/2 STARS ... Read more

Subjects:  1. American - African-American    2. Artists, Architects, Photographers    3. Biography & Autobiography    4. Biography / Autobiography    5. Biography/Autobiography    6. Reference    7. Biography & Autobiography / Artists, Architects, Photographers   

Reviews (7)

great book
shows the progression of his work over the years, a great insight into his evolution as an artist.

Extremely Good Book
I love this book! Full of great colorful plates and information about Basquiat's life.

An Unpardonable, Amatuerish Slop-Bucket

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Subjects:  1. Art    2. Art & Art Instruction    3. Basquiat, Jean Michel    4. Exhibitions    5. History - Contemporary (1945- )    6. History - General    7. Individual Artist    8. Popular Culture - General    9. Art styles: c 1960 -    10. Individual artists    11. Painting & paintings   

Reviews (15)

FAST FORGET TUPA KNOWS
I am not convinced that this is the BEST Jean Michel Basquiat retrospective catalogue to date...but the work selected for this publication is certainly consistently better than most others published before or after this one. Basquiats peak of productivity was from1981-83 and much of thatwork is catalogued here..But the dissapointment is that many of his last works (circa 1988) will not be found here....but in the more extensive Basquiat catalogue published by the Tony Shafrazi Gallery. Another Man's Treasure
Such a tragedy for a talented fellow like Basquiat to succumb to the temptations of drugs at such an early age. His paintings are so raw and fresh. I feel as though he used canvasses as giant doodle pads which he displayed to the world. Many of our own doodle pads (next to our phones, on our office desks, etc.) end up in the [bin] but Basquiat's ended up in the galleries and museums of the world. Some think of his work as [bad] but I view it as a treasure. Fine art, cartoons, grafitti and doodling...the best things in life. This book is the best collection I've seen of his work. The reproductions are well done and the essays are enlightening. For the art afficianado, this book needs to join the collection.

Basquiat at its Best
If you are looking for a wonderful combination of Basquiat's work and biography, this is the book to own.This book is full of many beautiful color plates of his work, as well as the story of his short, successful, but tragic life as an artist who had his brief moment in the sun before succumbing to the drugs. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Art    2. Art & Art Instruction    3. Basquiat, Jean Michel    4. Criticism and interpretation    5. Exhibitions    6. History - General    7. Individual Artist    8. Art / Individual Artist   

Subjects:  1. Calendar    2. Non-Classifiable   

Reviews (1)

A short read but thorough pleasant visual look at Basquiat.
Although short, this hip designed gem of a book conducts interviews with those closest to JMB throughout his career including his old band, Fab 5 Freddy, his first dealer, his girlfriend, collectors and dealers includingMary Boone, excerpts from the Wathol diaries and so on.Great colorreproductions of his work and probably one of the most suited titles of anybooks about him. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Biography/Autobiography    2. History of art & design styles: from c 1900 -    3. Individual artists    4. Painting & paintings   

Reviews (4)

Concise and friendly, an ideal introduction
In spite of many who claim that Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) was but a flash in the pan, a faddish personality whose work won't survive, today there are many different presentations of his art published. This TASCHEN overview by Leonhard Emmerling, however, might be the best introduction for those who have never come across this great figure. Basquiat's art speaks to this reviewer who encountered the painter only years after the time in which he lived and worked, and Emmerling's book explains just what's so special about him.
Getting the Respect He Deserves
The myth of Jean Michel Basquiat has taken on the status of an "art cautionary tale". Born to a middle class family in Brooklyn's Park Slope, Basquiat first made a name for himself as a graffiti artist and punk musician in ate 70s Soho before reinventing himself as a painter. His work rode the painting boom of the early 80s where, along with Julian Schnabel and Europeans George Baselitz and Francesco Clemente he was associated with the Neo-Expressionist movement in art. Basquiat's studied primitive canvases, which mixed text, symbol, primitive figuration and abstract techniques became the rage in the burgeoning "art market" of the 80s, looked upon as much for "investment" purposes as for the intrinsic value of the work. Basquiat's meteoric rise to fame and romantic origins as a street artist sold his paintings as much as the actual work on canvas. And then when he fell, he fell hard. He was dropped by the very people who had made his career only a few years earlier and died of a drug overdose in 1987, at the age of 27. Farewell Basquiat By Salah Mahdi Abood
Farewell Basquiat! May the Lord grant you the ultimate paradise up in heaven above, Amen.
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Reviews (5)

Collection of pieces with interviews and retrospective essays
This collection of works by Jean-Michel Basquiat was prepared for an exhibition of the painter's works at the Museo Revoltella in Trieste in 1999.
OUTFITTED PLAYERS
Pzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...slang for "hey girl, how can I get wit chu? " Some poor reproductions.
Some of the drawings are disappointingly un-sharp reproductions and/or are too small. Basquiat's drawings are extremely delicate and detailed and more beautiful than his paintings. They must be reproduced with high quality sharpness and at a proper size to be fully enjoyed and appreciated. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. American - African-American    2. Art    3. Art & Art Instruction    4. Basquiat, Jean Michel    5. Exhibitions    6. Individual Artist    7. Popular Culture - General    8. Art styles: c 1960 -    9. Individual artists    10. Painting & paintings   

Reviews (8)

Suzanne
I had the honor of knowing Suzanne.She's an extraordinary human being, and I'm glad that someone else found her as special as I did.This book is simple, haunting, and beautifully written.Blessings on Suzanne, wherever she may be.

Hearts and Tracks
This book was a excellent book in the matter that it protrayed another perspective of Jean-Michel Basquiat and let us in on the life of one of his most enduring muses in his short and unfortunate addictive lifestyle and life.The books poetic writings give Jean-Michel and Suzannes life together a hard tragedy instead of a glamorous protrayal (tragedy is the actual matter of fact).Jean-Michel and Suzanne's relationship was truely bizarre and not understanding to the everyday person.People who know or know of Jean-Michel probably never knew the side of him that Suzanne saw, and it is refreshing and wonderful that we were allowed to read such intimate details of their life together.I titled this review "Hearts and Tracks" because the book is full of heart and the heroine abuse of Suzanne and Basquiat (including a discription of his unfortunate death).

no title
The book came in the maximum amount of time I expected - 2-14 business days from the notice I received from the seller that the item had been shipped. The quality of the item was high, much higher than expected for a used book. It looked brand new and I was very pleased with the item. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Artists, Architects, Photographers    2. Biography & Autobiography    3. Biography / Autobiography    4. Basquiat, Jean Michel    5. Literary    6. Art styles: c 1960 -    7. Biography: general    8. Individual artists    9. USA    10. Mallouk, Suzanne    11. African American artists    12. New York (N.Y.)    13. People of Color   

Subjects:  1. African American Poetry    2. American - General    3. American Contemporary Poetry - Individual Poets    4. Artists    5. Basquiat, Jean-Michel    6. Poetry    7. Poetry / Single Author / General   

Subjects:  1. American - General    2. Art    3. Art & Art Instruction    4. Basquiat, Jean Michel    5. Exhibitions    6. History - General   

Subjects:  1. Art    2. Art & Art Instruction    3. History - General    4. History Of Fine Arts    5. Painting    6. Techniques - Painting    7. Art / History / General    8. Painting & paintings   

Subjects:  1. History of art & design styles: from c 1900 -    2. Individual artists   

Subjects:  1. Exhibition catalogues and specific collections   

Subjects:  1. Basquiat, Jean Michel   

Subjects:  1. Basquiat, Jean-Michel    2. Exhibitions   

Reviews (9)

a little over-indulgent...
ive been 'a writer' in the loosest form of the word for omose twenty years now and on occassion i'll pick up some other people's poetry and see what's what... i was standin in a bookstore flippin thru mr. young's 'jellyroll' and instantly loved it! - i didnt buy it tho - i'm cheap and i'm thrifty and 'to repel ghost' seemed to be the better buy for my money (there's like abillion poems in this thang!)...
excellent
This book is a powerful rumination on Basquiat's life and themes.The poetry is consistantly alive and amazingly free of flab for a book of over 300 pages. rich and rewarding
I'm mystified by some of these negative comments, which all seem to be either about some meta-conversation about the book (was Basquiat exploited? sure, but not by Kevin Young!) or its author (how the hell does anyone here know how poor or rich he was growing up?). Those who have actually read the book know how thoughtful, gorgous and rich it is; those who have not yet ought to, especially before writing barely-literate rants against it. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. American - General    2. American Contemporary Poetry    3. Artists    4. Basquiat, Jean-Michel    5. General    6. Poetry   

Reviews (4)

response to someone that thinks they know art
the reviewer must know something everyone else in the world doesn't know. this book is even further proof of the genius of what basquiat did, and what he was able to accomplish in such a short career. just because you do not understand something does not mean it is not valid. that is the point of basquiat's work, which was so layered in meaning that many credit him with being a precursor to today's sampling craze. i suggest you read a little more into something before discounting one of the greatest artists of our generation.

a must have for any basquiat fan!
this is the fifth book i have on basquiat and i am very happy to say that most of the works reproduced in this gorgeous book do not appear in any of the other books i have on him. the quality of the work is splendid and thereproductions are gorgeous!and the book is thick and a treat to look at! i would recommend it to anyone who loves basquiat's brillant works. the guywas a genius and he shines in this book!

This book is wonderful but......
I still dind't get thisbook..but I think it is very nice.My major is visual communication art,so I'm always read books about art.I know many American artist,especially I'm mad about him.If you look his works,you canfeel "nature".Maybe It will be a good guide to beginners. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Art    2. Art & Art Instruction    3. History - Modern    4. History - Modern (Late 19th Century to 1945)    5. Individual Artist    6. Popular Culture - Counter Culture    7. Painting & paintings   

Subjects:  1. European - Spanish & Portuguese    2. Literary Criticism    3. Spanish: Adult Nonfiction