Gordon Bennett’s series Notes to Basquiat
is inspired by the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat, the Haitian-American
artist with Puerto-Rican heritage who came to prominence in the USA in
the 1980s. Bennett’s series works across both Australian and American
cultures, with wider historic references to the radical and the marginalised.
In his artist’s statement, composed as a letter to Basquiat, Bennett says:
‘I guess it spoke to me of the traces of different experience and layers
that make us the individuals we are and the histories of shared experience
and levels we can relate to each other as human beings in the world of
material existence, even though we may be separated by cultural context,
time, space and death.’ These works, like Basquiat's, use images of the
body to expose both pain and anguish and a common humanity. By peeling
back the skin and flesh to reveal the innards, ribs and skeleton, the
reality embodied in the idea "that we are all alike underneath" is also
revealed.
Notes to Basquiat: Famous boomerang 1998
Synthetic polymer paint on paper
120 x 80cm
Collection: Paul Eliadis Collection of Contemporary Australian Art, Australia
Notes to Basquiat: Kwijibo 1998
Synthetic polymer paint on paper
120 x 80cm
Collection: Paul Eliadis Collection of Contemporary Australian Art, Australia
Notes to Basquiat: Unreasonable facsimile 1998
Synthetic polymer paint on paper
120 x 80cm
Collection: Paul Eliadis Collection of Contemporary Australian Art, Australia
Notes to Basquiat: Australiana 1998
Synthetic polymer paint on paper
120 x 80cm
Collection: Paul Eliadis Collection of Contemporary Australian Art, Australia
Notes to Basquiat:(ab)Original 1998
Synthetic polymer paint on paper
120 x 80cm
Collection: Paul Eliadis Collection of Contemporary Australian Art, Australia
Notes to Basquiat: Australia Day re-enactment 1998
Synthetic polymer paint on paper
120 x 80cm
Collection: Paul Eliadis Collection of Contemporary Australian Art, Australia
"A Short Note to Basquiat"
Dear Jean-Michel Basquiat,
In 1994 I purchased a book on your work published as a catalogue to a
1992 exhibition at the Whitney. I was drawn once again to the semiotic
and painterly fields of your work and particularly to the layered lines
of your drawing of the human figure. I guess it spoke to me of the traces
of different experience and layers that make us the individuals we are
and the histories of shared experience and levels we can relate to each
other as human beings in the world of material existence, even though
we may be separated by cultural context, time, space and death.
I was excited to find in the essay "Welcome to the Terrordome: Jean Michel Basquiat and the "Dark" side of Hybridity" by Dick Hebdige, in your book, a reference to Stuart Hall which I have included in my own past efforts to "explain" myself - it reads: "Cultural identities are the points of identification, or suture, which are made within the discourses of history and culture - not an essence, but a positioning. Identities come from somewhere, have histories, and like everything which is historical, they undergo constant transformation. Far from being eternally fixed in some essentialised past, they are subject to the continuous "play" of history, culture and power. Far from being grounded in mere "recovery" of the past, which is waiting to be found, and which, when found, will secure our sense of ourselves into eternity, identities are the names we give to the different ways we are positioned by, and position ourselves within, the narratives of the past."
Another quote in the Dick Hebdige essay I found I connected with was by Greg Tate which reads: "To be a race-identified race-refugee is to tap-dance on a tightrope". You lost your balance. I feel I can understand why. Jean-Michel Basquiat I salute you.
Yours Sincerely,
Gordon Bennett