Boom For Real was an exhibition at the Barbican Center, show casing one of the worlds most significant artist of the 20th century, Jean- Michel Basquiat. This exhibition was primary research for my dissertation, The World of Streetwear, where I talked about what streetwear is/ is not and its greatest influences, Basquiat being one of them. I know him through the tag he created with Al Diaz, SAMO © which always followed with a surreal yet poetic graffiti phrases. He also worked with and was good friends with Keith Haring, one of my personal favourite graffiti artists who I found through promoting what was the current situation with Aids which had taken the lives of their friend Stewart and hip- hoop star Eazy E. All huge influences within the streetwear world. I went to this exhibition to learn more about Basquiat himself as well as the movement he belonged to.
Please note that photography was not permitted throughout this exhibition and therefore the following photos are not mine.
NEW YORK/ NEW WAVE
In February 1981, the landmark exhbition New York/ New Wave opened at P.S.1 in Long Island City. Curated by Diego Cortez, co-founder of the famous Mudd Club, the show feature over 1,600 works by more than 100 emerging and celebrated artists, musicians and writers, including Andy Warhol, Nan Goldin, Robert Mapplethrope, David Byrne and William Burroughs. Cortez wanted to convey the downtown counter-cultural scene of the time, capturing the sprawling energy of the New and No Wave music and its reach into visual art. Basquiat was the only artist who had been given prominent space for painting, the pieces were made on canvas, paper, wood, scrap pieces of metal and foam rubber. They depict the ominous skyscraper- laden skyline- his responses to the noise of Manhattan. This exhibition is what launched Basquiat’s career.
SAMO©
Basquiat had left is family home in June 1978 and during this time New York was on the brink of ruin. President Gerald Ford had denied feral assistance to save the city from bankruptcy. Violent crime had doubled, while areas such as the Bronx were nightly lit up by flames, as landlords disposed of buildings that they could no longer let or maintain. It was in this context that he and teamed up with Al Diaz, a friend from school, invented the character SAMO© a play on phrase “same old shit”.
Although New York was covered in graffiti, this was different, it had a surreal tone to it. With catchy statements capturing the attention of the New Yorkers. But come 21st September 1978, the SoHo Weekly News appealed for the artists responsible but the Village Voice had revealed the culprits as Jean- Michel Basquiat and Al Diaz and was therefore forced to end their collaboration. 
Canal Zone
The Canal Zone was a 5,000- square- foot loft at 533 Canal Street, which was rented by British artist Stan Peskett. He and Michael Holman from the band glam rock band, the tubes, invited graffiti artists Lee and Fab 5 to make murals for the space. April 29th 1979, they throw a launch party to encourage other downtown scene graffiti artist, and Basquiat was invited to paint SAMO© live on television. That night he made many friens and soon to be collaborators, including Jennifer Stein who was an apprentice for Peskett, and soon collaborated with Jean making postcards. They got their inspiration from their surroundings, street detritus, newpaper headlines, cigarette butts, advertisements. Glenn O’Brien said “he ate up every image, every word, every bit, of data, that appeared in front of him and he processed it all into a bebop cubist pop art cartoon gospel that synthesized the whole overload we lived under into something that made an astonishing new sense.”
