Lisane Basquiat on King Pleasure

During the summer I saw the Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure show in NewYork City. Curated by Basquiat’s family, the show featured over 200 never-before-seen or rarely shown works to tell the story of Jean-Michel from amore personal perspective.

I reached out to Lisane Basquiat, Jean-Michel’s sister, because I was interested in learning more about her and her family’s curatorial process. Did their vision for the show evolve over time? Did they do a significant amount of research on their brother to prepare for the show, or did they already know everything? Was there anything new they discovered in the process? Lisane told me that the show did evolve over time, but they had a strong idea of the major elements. “We mostly knew what works we wanted… and we knew we wanted to create an experience that would give people a more intimate view of Jean-Michel—we knew we wanted to recreate some space and then we kind of dove into it and it got really, really fun. For example, the living room, the dining room, the kitchen, and the studio are all really made up of a lot of artifacts and ephemera. For the living room, almost everything in that room actually was in our living room… in the kitchen, the table that you see is our actual kitchen table from our childhood home.”

From the replication of Basquiat family rooms to the smaller details, such as the different textures of the walls, the space is very personal and has clearly been transformed to show Basquiat’s work. This differs greatly to the exhibition space of any other museum or gallery that needs to display a variety of artists. Another differentiation between the Jean-Michel Basquiat: KingPleasure show and a museum or gallery exhibition is the context this show provides into Basquiat’s life, which strengthens the viewers understanding of the works. Due to the amount of works included in the exhibition, and the variety of works spanning throughout the course of his life, the viewer can seethe progression of Jean-Michel’s artistic practice. The viewer can also read comprehensive description cards that describe the works and pair that with the substantive biographical information on his life that is shared throughout the show.

One part of the show that stood out to me was a map of “Basquiat’s New York” with many locations labeled. As a New Yorker, it was interesting to see Basquiat’s favorite restaurants and where he went to school. Being able to visually seethe boroughs annotated allowed me to have a better understanding of Jean-Michel, be able to relate to him, and be able to really envision him in the city.Basquiat, this icon of an artist, felt more human and I felt personally connected to him. Lisane explains that this was the exact aim of the show saying,“museums have done incredible work in terms of bringing art to the public and those exhibitions are incredible… this is a way of deepening that connection…it is not either a museum or an immersive experience… I think we can work together so it’s more of an ‘and’”.  

I went to another Basquiat exhibition at a gallery in New York a week after I went to the Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure show and I immediately noticed a difference in the way people moved around the gallery compared to theKing Pleasure show. While I loved the second Basquiat exhibition I saw at the gallery, I appreciated it more because I had taken art history classes that covered Basquiat and because I had just seen King Pleasure. The gallery exhibition assumed prior knowledge, or assumed appreciation based on the works’ aesthetics, whereas King Pleasure assumed no knowledge.Lisane said, “A lot of the feedback that we’re getting is from people who perhaps feel more comfortable in an immersive situation or people who are really attracted to coming to connect with art, because it is being shown and reflected in this different kind of experience that really provides more of a holistic view of the artist.”

EvenBasquiat’s family discovered more about Jean-Michel and felt more connected tohim through this curatorial process. “There are a lot of phrases or mentions ofthings and nods towards things in his work so we had a lot of fun going ‘Whatdoes this mean?’ and then researching and giggling sometimes at some of thereferences he made.” For the Basquiat family the curation of this exhibitionwas deeply personal. “It was a lot of fun for us, my sister, Nora and I, totake this deep dive not only into Jean-Michel’s work but also into our familieshistory in a way… my sister, Nora, and I also wrote the catalogue last summer…three months where we were completely immersed in our family history and wherewe come from.”

TheJean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure show is a must-see exhibition thattruly honors Jean-Michel’s legacy in a very special and intimate way. Lisanetold me, “Everything in the exhibition is ours.” All the works on displaybelong to the Basquiat family. Lisane, her sister, and her step-mother, asLisane put it, “touched every single thing in this exhibition.”  Lisane said “the intention was to dosomething completely different” and the Basquiat family definitely succeeded.