Warhol & Basquiat Painting To Fetch $18 Million At First Sale In Over 15 Years
Image via Sotheby’s
A landmark work from the artistic powerhouse duo of Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat is set to hit the auction block at Sotheby’s this May, with an estimated price tag of US$18 million. Titled simply Untitled, 1984, the large-scale piece (nearly 10 feet tall and 13 feet wide) is poised to potentially shatter the existing record for a joint work by these two artistic titans.
The current record belongs to their 1985 painting Zenith, which sold for US$11.4 million in 2014. This upcoming auction, part of Sotheby’s Contemporary Evening Auction, marks the first time Untitled, 1984 will be offered for public sale in nearly 15 years. It paints a picture of the enduring appeal and artistic merit of Warhol and Basquiat’s brief but striking collaboration in the mid-1980s.
Warhol, the Pop Art pioneer known for his silkscreens of celebrities and consumer goods, and Basquiat, the Neo-Expressionist artist with his raw, graffiti-influenced style, formed an unlikely yet electrifying creative partnership. Their artistic exchange yielded over 160 works in 1984 and 1985, a period that saw Basquiat’s star ascend in the art world, while Warhol was already a well-established figure.
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Untitled, 1984 embodies the essence of this artistic dialogue. The work is expected to draw intense interest from collectors, not only for its size and historical significance but also for the way it exemplifies the fascinating interplay between two artistic giants with contrasting styles.
As was the way things usually went with these collaborations, Warhol first laid down the groundwork with his signature Pop Art imagery of baseball mitts, tennis rackets, sneakers, numbers, and the Zenith Electronics logo, a brand frequently used by the artist. These elements point to Warhol’s fascination with American consumer culture.
With the canvas prepped by Warhol, Basquiat entered the picture, quite literally. His artistic response became a vibrant counterpoint to Warhol’s base, with an explosion of color, jagged scrawl, and totemic heads with toothy grins and spiky hair, all pulsating with his signature energy. These contrasting motifs—the calculated coolness of Warhol and the raw energy of Basquiat—are what make Untitled, 1984 such a captivating piece.
“Of all the Warhol-Basquiat works from this brief and fertile moment, Untitled stands out as one of the supreme examples, fully showcasing the range of their artistic powers,” shares Lucius Elliot, Sotheby’s head of contemporary marquee auctions in New York.
“The painting is a masterpiece of juxtaposition and contradiction: the cool, mechanical restraint of Warhol’s imagery, overlaid with Basquiat’s anarchic energy and freewheeling technique. Warhol and Basquiat perform a call and response throughout the painting, riffing and improvising off one another’s work to create a radical, harmonious symphony of color, imagery, and form.”
Art aficionados will have the opportunity to view Untitled, 1984 in person before it goes up for auction. The piece will embark on a pre-auction tour, stopping first in Hong Kong from April 2 to 6 and then traveling to London on April 11 to 12, before returning to New York for its marquee week exhibition in early May.
[via Hypebeast, ARTnews, Observer, cover image via Sotheby’s
