Obituaries : Jean-Michel Basquiat; Artist Known for Graffiti-Style Work

Jean-Michel Basquiat, whose art was first displayed as graffiti on the walls of subways but sold recently for $25,000 to $50,000 per effort, has died at the age of 27.

The New York Times reported Monday that the Brooklyn-born artist had died either of a heart attack or a drug overdose Friday at his home in the East Village section of Manhattan.

Son of Haitian and Puerto Rican parents, Basquiat and his friend, Al Diaz, signed their exotic graffiti “Samo,” until Basquiat went out on his own. In 1982, when his work and his fame had spread West, Los Angeles Times critic William Wilson praised his vigorous, Neo-Expressionist paintings.

Basquiat worked with large, primitively drawn skulls, arrows, animal bones and daggers, interspersing stick figures of humans and occasional letters among them. The spontaneity and control of his work before he had even turned 20 endeared him to writers and critics across the country.

Basquiat had been a close friend of Andy Warhol, and the New York Times quoted the artist’s agent, Vrej Baghoomian, as saying “Andy’s (recent) death really affected him.”

His paintings are now included in New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art and the Museum of Modern Art.