Title
Notes to Basquiat (in the future art will not be boring)
1999
Artist
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Details
- Date
- 1999
- Media category
- Painting
- Materials used
- synthetic polymer paint on linen
- Dimensions
- 182.5 x 182.5 cm stretcher
- Signature & date
Signed and dated u.l. verso on canvas, pencil "G Bennett 31-8-1999/ …".
- Credit
- Patrick White Bequest Fund 2014
- Location
- Not on display
- Accession number
- 21.2014
- Copyright
- © The Estate of Gordon Bennett
- Artist information
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Gordon Bennett
Works in the collection
- Share
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About
Gordon Bennett's paintings in the late 1980s and early 90s were informed by theories about appropriation - the borrowing of images from other artists and visual sources - and by post-colonial theories about identity and history. Appropriation allowed Bennett to refer to both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal art, and situate his painting in a fluid area between these two overlapping forms of contemporary art.
This painting emanates from the 'Notes to Basquiat' series of paintings, where the artist takes appropriation to a new level within his practice. Bennett not only borrows images from the work of American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, but also begins to mimic Basquiat's spontaneous and gestural urban style of painting, reflecting his involvement in the graffiti culture of the United States. This citation of Basquiat's work acts for Bennett as a mode of communication with the American artist who died in 1988. This conversation is manifest quite literally when Bennett drafts a letter to the - then already deceased - Basquiat, outlining his reasons for emulating his style. Underlying this dialogue with Basquiat Bennett's need to re-contextualise the issues that he has explored throughout his artistic career, confronting them within a global context.
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Exhibition history
Shown in 6 exhibitions
Notes to Basquiat: one tense moment, Bellas Milani Gallery, Fortitude Valley, Jun 1999–Unknown
Biennale of Sydney 2000, Museum of Contemporary Art, Australia, 26 May 2000–30 Jul 2000
Outsider/ insider: the art of Gordon Bennett, AAMU, Museum of contemporary Aboriginal art, Utrecht, 21 Jun 2012–09 Dec 2012
Mémoires vives: une histoire de l'art aborigine, Musée d’Aquitaine, Bordeaux, 16 Oct 2013–30 Mar 2014
Australian art and the Russian avant-garde, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 29 Jul 2017–29 Oct 2017
Carnivalesque, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 23 Jun 2018–28 Oct 2018
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Bibliography
Referenced in 7 publications
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Jérôme Bellay (Editor), Le Journal du Dimanche, 'L'art aborigène, à la croisée des mondes', pg. 16, Paris, 08 Dec 2013, 16 (colour illus.). author unknown
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Paul Matharan and Arnaud Morvan, Mémoires vives: une histoire de l'art aborigine, Bordeaux, 2013, 220, 221 (colour illus.).
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Ewen McDonald (Editor), Biennale of Sydney 2000, Sydney, 2000, 39 (colour illus.), 210.
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Georges Petitjean, Kitty Zijlmans and Ian McLean, Outsider/insider: the art of Gordon Bennett, Ghent, 2012, 50 (colour illus.).
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Khaled Sabsabi, Look, 'The art that made me', pg. 23-25, Sydney, May 2017-Jun 2017, 24 (colour illus.).
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John Saxby (Editor), Look, 'The art that made me: Reg Mombassa', Sydney, Nov 2015, 13.
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Bérénice Geoffroy Schneiter, Le Journal des Arts, 'Art premier: La création aborigène repensée', pg. 11, Paris, Nov 2013-Dec 2013, 11 (colour illus.).
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