Dos Cabezas Explained

Dos Cabezas
Artist:Jean-Michel Basquiat
Year:1982
Movement:Neo-expressionism
Height Imperial:59.75
Width Imperial:60.5
Museum:Private collection

Dos Cabezas (pronounced as /es/, "two heads") is a painting created by American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat in 1982. The double portrait resulted from Basquiat's first formal meeting with his idol, American pop artist Andy Warhol.

History

Basquiat first met Andy Warhol when he sold him a postcard in 1979.[1] Later, when Basquiat was selling painted sweatshirts, he went to the Factory and Warhol purchased some. "I just wanted to meet him, he was an art hero of mine," Basquiat recalled.[2] Bruno Bischofberger became Basquiat's art dealer and organized a one-man show in his Zurich gallery in September 1982.[3] Bischofberger, who also represented Warhol, arranged a lunch meeting between the two artists on October 4, 1982.[4] [5] Warhol documented the meeting in a diary entry, which was posthumously published in The Andy Warhol Diaries (1989):

Down to meet Bruno Bischofberger (cab $7.50). He brought Jean-Michel Basquiat with him. He's the kid who used the name "Samo" when he used to sit on the sidewalk in Greenwich Village and paint T-shirts, and I'd give him $10 here and there…He was just one of those kids who drove me crazy. He's black but some people say he's Puerto Rican so I don't know. And then Bruno discovered him and now he’s on Easy Street. He's got a great loft on Christie Street. He was a middle-class Brooklyn kid—I mean, he went to college and things—and he was trying to be like that, painting in the Greenwich Village. And so had lunch for them and then I took a Polaroid and he went home and within two hours a painting was back, still wet, of him and me together. And I mean, just getting to Christie Street must have taken an hour. He told me his assistant painted it.[6]
Dos Cabezas, meaning "two heads" in Spanish, is based on the self-portrait Warhol took with Basquiat. The artwork ignited a close friendship between them which led to a collaboration on numerous paintings.[7] Warhol used a Polaroid he took of Basquiat to create the silkscreen portrait Jean-Michel Basquiat (1982) using his piss painting technique.[8] Although Basquiat and Warhol created several portraits of each other in the following years, Dos Cabezas is their only joint portrait. It sold for $7 million at Christie's post-war and contemporary evening sale in November 2010.[9]

Exhibitions

Dos Cabezas has been exhibited at the following art institutions:

See also

References

  1. Web site: Brumfitt. Stuart. September 19, 2017. New York Inspiration Tales from Teen Basquiat's Best Friend. 2020-10-04. Amuse. en.
  2. Book: The New York Times Guide to the Arts of the 20th Century: 1900-1929. 2002. Taylor & Francis. 978-1-57958-290-6. 2547. en.
  3. Book: Hoban, Phoebe. Basquiat: A Quick Killing in Art. 1998. New York : Viking. Internet Archive. 978-0-670-85477-6. 134.
  4. Web site: Faughnan. Ally. May 28, 2019. The best, worst, and weirdest parts of Warhol and Basquiat's friendship. 2020-10-04. Dazed. en.
  5. Web site: Collabs origin Galerie Bruno Bischofberger . 2023-12-10 . GALERIE BRUNO BISCHOFBERGER . de.
  6. Book: Warhol. Andy. The Andy Warhol diaries. Hackett. Pat. 1989. New York, NY : Warner Books. The Archive of Contemporary Music. 978-0-446-51426-2. 462.
  7. Web site: July 13, 2020. Warhol and Basquiat. 2020-10-04. Phillips. en.
  8. Web site: McGreevy. Nora. October 6, 2021. Why Andy Warhol Peed on This Portrait of Jean-Michel Basquiat. live. 2021-10-07. Smithsonian Magazine. en. https://web.archive.org/web/20211006203047/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/why-andy-warhol-peed-on-this-portrait-of-jean-michel-basquiat-180978824/ . 2021-10-06 .
  9. News: Vogel. Carol. November 10, 2010. Lichtenstein Tops Warhol in Auction at Christie's. en-US. The New York Times. 2020-10-03. 0362-4331.
  10. Web site: Jean-Michel Basquiat, Dos Cabezas. 2020-10-04. Christie's. en.
  11. Web site: October 1, 2017. Boom for Real: Basquiat comes to London. 2020-10-03. Christie's. en.
  12. Web site: Wolf. Michael. April 12, 2019. Warhol at the Whitney, Basquiat at the Brant and Their Collaboration. live. 2021-04-05. en-US. https://web.archive.org/web/20190416203215/https://artzealous.com/warhol-at-the-whitney-basquiat-at-the-brant-and-their-collaboration/ . 2019-04-16 .