Jean-Michel Basquiat
34.8 × 30.0 in
The most figurative work in the Untitled Portfolio (from Leonardo), Untitled 3 by Jean-Michel Basquiat moves away from isolated anatomical forms and toward bodies in motion — five or six loosely rendered figures dispersed across the open sheet, some upright, some gesturing, one annotated YOUTH BECOMING A RIGHTLEG, another simply HERO. The figures are skeletal in their economy of line, recalling Leonardo's studies of proportion and movement while refusing their idealisation entirely. These are not perfected bodies. They are bodies in the process of being drawn, assembled from marks that remain visible as marks.
Leonardo's figure studies — particularly his investigations into proportion derived from Vitruvius — were attempts to establish an ideal human form, the body as mathematical principle. Basquiat's figures in this print resist that project at every point: they are asymmetric, abbreviated, their limbs incomplete, their postures unstable. HERO appears as a label beneath one of them, not as a quality the figure embodies but as a word applied from outside — the same operation Basquiat performed throughout his career with crowns, with copyright symbols, with crossed-out names, asking what it means to name something rather than simply showing it.
The incidental studio marks that run through all five prints in the portfolio are particularly present here, the warm tones of the Okawara paper visible through and around the figures, the whole sheet retaining a quality of something in process rather than resolved. Untitled 3 (from Leonardo) is the print in the suite where Basquiat's own hand is most legible — not as a diagram but as a gesture.
For more information or to buy Untitled 3 (from Leonardo) by Jean-Michel Basquiat, contact our specialists using the enquiry button above.
Explore Jean-Michel Basquiat prints for sale, or discover how to sell Jean-Michel Basquiat prints.Join our mailing list
* denotes required fields
We will process the personal data you have supplied in accordance with our privacy policy (available on request). You can unsubscribe or change your preferences at any time by clicking the link in our emails.