Lot 1155: Jean Michel Basquiat Original Sculpture Head

ARTIST: Jean Michel Basquiat (1960 – 1988) TITLE: SAM II DATE: 1985 MEDIUM: Acrylic and Ink on a Wig Mannequin Wearing Large Stereo Headphones SIZE: 12” High X 10” Wide SIGNED: With JMB’s Signature Crown This fabulous work by Jean Michel Basquiat originated in 1985 and was given as a personal gift to Mr. Jimmy Hart (The Mouth of the South) WWF wrestling manager the week of Wrestlemania 1 that took place March 31, 1985 at Madison Square Garden Arena in New York where Jean Michel Basquiat, Andy Warhol and Andy Kauffman all attended the event. The week prior to the event, Basquiat, Warhol and Kauffman were attending a dinner with Mr. Jimmy Hart when Basquiat presented this amazing work to him. Jean Michel was a big fan of the WWF and of Jimmy Hart. Jean Michel stated that the headphones were a representation of how he wanted to cover his ears every time Jimmy Hart yelled through his megaphone. The headphones were owned and were worn by Basquiat. Provenance: Given to Mr. Jimmy Hart, New York, March 1985, from the artist Jean Michel Basquiat Acquired by Mr. Perry Horner from Jimmy Hart, Miami Florida 2012, Purchased from Perry Horner by Mr. Steve Wientraub Tampa Florida, 2014 Purchased from Wientraub by Mr. Harvey B. Yaris NY 2014

Art Sculpture

This is in excellent condition. Andy Warhol (b 1928-1987) was the most successful and highly paid commercial illustrator in New York even before he began to make art destined for galleries. Nevertheless, his screen printed images of Marilyn Monroe, soup cans, and sensational newspaper stories, quickly became synonymous with Pop art. He emerged from the poverty and obscurity of an Eastern European immigrant family in Pittsburgh, to become a charismatic magnet for bohemian New York, and to ultimately find a place in the circles of High Society. For many his ascent echoes one of Pop art's ambitions, to bring popular styles and subjects into the exclusive salons of high art. His elevation to the status of a popular icon represented a new kind of fame and celebrity for a fine artist. Andy Warhol, was an American artist who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationship between artistic expression, celebrity culture and advertisement that flourished by the 1960s. After a successful career as a commercial illustrator, Warhol became a renowned and sometimes controversial artist. The Andy Warhol Museum in his native city, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, holds an extensive permanent collection of art and archives. It is the largest museum in the United States dedicated to a single artist. The other partner on this piece is Jean-Michel Basquiat was born in 1960 and died in 1988 and was an American artist, musician, and producer. He first achieved notoriety as part of SAMO, an informal graffiti group who wrote enigmatic epigrams in the cultural hotbed of the Lower East Side of Manhattan during the late 1970s where the hip hop, post-punk and street art movements had coalesced. By the 1980s he was exhibiting his neo-expressionist and primitivist paintings in galleries and museums internationally. The Whitney Museum of American Art held a retrospective of his art in 1992. Basquiat used social commentary in his paintings as a springboard to deeper truths about the individual, as well as attacks on power structures and systems of racism, while his poetics were acutely political and direct in their criticism of colonialism and support for class struggle.