Artist Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Artwork Reveals Powerful Superhero Influences
His appreciation of comic book superheroes was threaded continuously throughout his remarkable body of artistic works
The late painter and graffiti writer Jean-Michel Basquiat didn’t have an uncanny talent to sketch out dynamic anatomy like Jack Kirby, Burne Hogarth, or the other comic art masters whose work would have made an impact on him as a young fan of comic books. In fact, according to the artist himself, art-making had always been a challenge.
In a 1983 interview for BFF Andy Warhol’s Interview magazine, when art critic Henry Geldzahler asked Basquiat to name the kinds of things he drew as a kid, New York’s then darling of the international art world made a glum and endearing confession:
“I was a really lousy artist as a kid. Too abstract expressionist…really messy. I’d never win painting contests. I remember losing to a guy who did a perfect Spider-Man.”
Asked if he was ever satisfied with his work as a child, Basquiat replied, “No, not at all. I really wanted to be the best artist in the class, but my work had a really ugly edge to it.”
Ironically, it was that ugly edge––and an unbridled passion to not let what he lacked in raw artistic talent to prevent him from creating — that would make Basquiat’s work some of the most both recognizable and desired works made by any artist of the postmodern era.
In May 2017, a Basquiat painting sold at auction for a record-breaking $110.5 million, the most that had ever been paid up to that point for a work of art produced by an American.
And despite Basquiat’s lamented inability to paint the perfect Spider-Man (like his childhood art class arch-rival), Marvel’s colorful wall crawler still appeared in his work. Along with Spidey, Basquiat also made use of several heroes and villains from the pages of comics, including Batman, the Joker, Superman, Thor, Captain America and others.
