A landmark exhibition of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s earliest works is heading back to the borough where it all began—and for New York art obsessives, this is the kind of show that doesn’t come around often.
Opening during New York Art Week this May, Our Friend, Jean: Early Works of Jean-Michel Basquiat will take over Brooklyn’s Bishop Gallery, offering a rare look at the artist before the fame, the auctions and the mythology. The show runs May 13–17 and centers on a deeply personal collection that captures Basquiat in his formative years, when he was still hustling between downtown apartments and making work wherever he could.
If you mostly know Basquiat as the painter whose works now sell for eye-watering sums, this exhibition takes it back to the start. Well before becoming an international art star in the 1980s, Basquiat first made a name for himself in late-’70s New York as part of the graffiti duo SAMO, tagging cryptic phrases across Lower Manhattan.
Much of the work on view comes from the collection of Alexis Adler, who lived with Basquiat during a crucial stretch from 1979 to 1980. Her archive includes intimate photographs and pieces created on everything from doors to furniture, documenting the moment just before Basquiat’s meteoric rise.
Adler’s images are considered among the most revealing visual records of Basquiat’s early life, and they’ve already been acquired, in part, by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. In Brooklyn, they’ll be shown alongside early works and contributions from other collectors and close friends, creating a fuller picture of the artist’s orbit at the time.
The exhibition doubles as the launch of the Bishop Arts & Research Center (BARC), a new initiative focused on preserving and sharing cultural histories. Programming throughout the week will include panels, screenings and conversations with people who knew the artist personally, adding another layer of context to the work.
For a city that shaped him (and still claims him), this is a rare chance to catch the spark before it turned into legend.