
Art Ideation
Inspiration from Jean Michel Basquiat
In a learning segment comprised of four lessons, students studied the life and work of Jean Michel Basquiat, an artist who started his career creating graffiti, but who transitioned to producing contemporary paintings reflecting his life and values, and experienced a meteoric rise in fame and fortune in the art world. Students experimented with Basquiat’s spontaneous style and processes he called “anti-art” such as erasures, graffiti-styled defacement and x-ray figures, but reflected their own heritages, identity symbols, personality traits, cultural heroes, life experiences and current visual culture.
Students discovered many sources for future art ideation including reflecting upon one's own culture, life experiences, and personality; borrowing a style of another artist and then changing it up or commenting on it in a new way to make it their own; appropriating and drastically reworking another artist’s imagery; and using readily available materials such as advertising leaflets, paper bags and posters in our visual culture in a new way.
The images that follow below are from the Basquiat-inspired lesson entitled, “Who R U?,” in which students created “Personality Post Cards,” from found advertising leaflets that focused on student identities.
Inspiration from Jean Michel Basquiat
In a learning segment comprised of four lessons, students studied the life and work of Jean Michel Basquiat, an artist who started his career creating graffiti, but who transitioned to producing contemporary paintings reflecting his life and values, and experienced a meteoric rise in fame and fortune in the art world. Students experimented with Basquiat’s spontaneous style and processes he called “anti-art” such as erasures, graffiti-styled defacement and x-ray figures, but reflected their own heritages, identity symbols, personality traits, cultural heroes, life experiences and current visual culture.
Students discovered many sources for future art ideation including reflecting upon one's own culture, life experiences, and personality; borrowing a style of another artist and then changing it up or commenting on it in a new way to make it their own; appropriating and drastically reworking another artist’s imagery; and using readily available materials such as advertising leaflets, paper bags and posters in our visual culture in a new way.
The images that follow below are from the Basquiat-inspired lesson entitled, “Who R U?,” in which students created “Personality Post Cards,” from found advertising leaflets that focused on student identities.
In “Heroes & Influencers” another Basquiat-inspired lesson, students developed a work focused on one of their personal heroes and they interacted with the graphics on a shopping bag or movie poster. These works mimicked Basquiat’s collaborations with Andy Warhol’s printed corporate logos.