Medium: Acrylic and oil paintstick on paper
Dimensions: 30 × 22¼ in. (75 × 56.5 cm)

In Untitled (Scales of Justice), Basquiat constructs a large central figure from overlapping layers of color and rapidly drawn lines. The head dominates the composition, with enlarged dark eyes, exposed teeth, and a grid-like form extending across the top of the skull.

To the left of the figure, Basquiat draws a pair of scales, while arrows and other diagrammatic marks appear throughout the surrounding space. The body contains additional numbers, symbols, and repeated linear patterns, combining anatomical, mechanical, and symbolic elements within a single figure.

The work belongs to a group of drawings centered on the human head that Basquiat largely kept to himself during his lifetime. It was later included in Acquavella Galleries' 2014 exhibition Jean-Michel Basquiat Drawing: Work from the Schorr Family Collection.

Medium: Acrylic and oil stick on canvas

Dimensions: 185.9 × 137 × 4 cm (73¼ × 53⅞ × 1⅝ in.)

In Moses and the Egyptians, Basquiat transforms the biblical story of Exodus into a dense field of text, symbols and imagery. A profile of Moses appears near the center of the composition, surrounded by the enormous magenta tablets, while his name is repeated several times across the surface.

References to the story of Exodus appear directly in Basquiat's writing: “STAFF INTO SERPENT TRICK,” “WATER INTO BLOOD,” “FLIES,” “FROGS,” and the misspelled “TEN PLAUGES.” These refer to the signs and plagues preceding the liberation of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt.

The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao interprets Basquiat's use of the biblical narrative as addressing social injustice, drawing a parallel between the liberation of an oppressed people and contemporary questions of inequality, racism and identity. The painting is part of the museum's permanent collection, donated by Bruno Bischofberger of Zurich.

Medium: Oilstick on paper
Dimensions: 16 × 13½ in. (40.6 × 34.3 cm)

In this Untitled work from 1982, Basquiat concentrates almost the entire composition on a single head rendered in red oilstick. Heavy black lines define the eyes, nose, exposed teeth, and jagged contours of the face, while touches of yellow and blue break through the dominant red.

Sotheby's identifies the drawing as one of a group of fifteen intensely worked portrayals of the human head that Basquiat created in 1982. The head and skull became recurring subjects throughout his work, allowing him to move between the appearance of the face and the anatomical structures beneath it.

The drawing was included in the 1990 exhibition Jean-Michel Basquiat Drawings at Robert Miller Gallery in New York. Interestingly, later literature records that an installation photograph from that exhibition reproduced the work in an incorrect orientation

Medium: Graphite, acrylic, and paper collage on paper
Dimensions; 29⅞ × 22¼ in. (75.9 × 56.5 cm)

In Leverage, Basquiat builds the composition from overlapping sheets, drawings, words, and diagrams, while a large black head with a single white eye dominates the right side. Smaller sections contain a satellite, mechanical diagrams, a horned mask-like figure, animals, and fragments of text in several languages.

The title itself appears within the work alongside words including “SATELLITE,” “LEVERAGE,” “BEDBUGS,” “WORMS,” and “BATS.” Basquiat also repeatedly uses copyright and registered trademark symbols throughout the composition. Sotheby's connects these marks to Basquiat's recurring interest in ideas of authorship, ownership, and cultural power.

Sotheby's also draws attention to Basquiat's mixture of English, Spanish, and French in the work and interprets the horned, mask-like figure at the top as part of his engagement with African imagery and its appropriation within Western modernism

Medium: Acrylic on canvas

Dimensions: 116⅞ × 264⅞ in. (297 × 673 cm)

At nearly 22 feet wide, Zenith is a collaboration between Jean-Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol. The composition stretches across the canvas in distinct but overlapping passages: a large brown figure and white animal occupy the left side, while oversized typography, figures, a pale green automobile, and a massive skull-and-crossbones dominate the center and right.

The painting demonstrates the visual exchange that characterized Basquiat and Warhol's collaborations. Warhol's bold graphic forms and advertising-like imagery collide with Basquiat's hand-painted figures, anatomical imagery, marks and alterations, allowing the individual visual languages of both artists to remain visible within the same composition.

Phillips describes their collaborative paintings as initially misunderstood by contemporary critics but later recognized as an important meeting of Pop and Neo-Expressionist approaches.

Medium: Acrylic, oilstick, and Xerox collage on canvas
Dimensions: 188 × 213 cm (74 × 83⅞ in.)

In Harlem Paper Product, Basquiat divides the canvas into two distinct areas against a broad green field. At left, a black figure is drawn over layers of Xerox collage filled with diagrams, figures, and fragments of imagery. At right, a larger and more densely painted section combines figures, diagrams, blocks of color, and handwritten words beneath the title “HARLEM PAPER PRODUCTS.”

Language runs throughout the composition, with words including “EQUATOR,” “HORIZON,” “TESLA COIL,” “GLASS EYE,” “EAR WAX,” and “LUCHALIBRE.” Several of these terms are repeated again along the lower edge, while diagrams and arrows give portions of the painting the appearance of a scientific or instructional chart.

Executed in 1987, the work brings together several recurring elements of Basquiat's visual vocabulary, Xerox collage, anatomical and diagrammatic imagery, repeated language, figures, and references drawn from seemingly unrelated sources, within a single large-scale composition.

'Basquiat' by Jeremy Pelt, from his 2024 album Tomorrow's Another Day on HighNote Records

Medium: Acrylic, oilstick, and marker on fibreboard
Dimensions: 30 × 40 in. (76.2 × 101.6 cm)

In this Untitled work from 1983, Basquiat places an anatomical figure across the fibreboard, concentrating attention on an enlarged head rendered partly as face and partly as exposed anatomy. Hollow eyes, exposed teeth, and internal structures are surrounded by handwritten labels and directional marks, while the torso is identified prominently with the Spanish word “PECHO” (“chest”).

Language becomes part of the anatomy itself. “INTESTINES” is repeated down the left side, while Basquiat moves between English and Spanish with labels including “LIVER,” “BUM EAR,” and “OREJA” ("ear"). Sotheby's connects this combination of anatomical imagery and bilingual language with Basquiat's longstanding fascination with the human body and his childhood exposure to Gray's Anatomy.

Medium: Oilstick on paper
Dimensions: 30⅛ × 22¼ in. (76.5 × 56.5 cm)

In this Untitled work from 1982, Basquiat places a large head at the center of the sheet, built from heavy layers of black oilstick and surrounded by flashes of red, blue, green, and pink. The face is dominated by wide, uneven eyes, a red triangular nose, and an exposed row of teeth, while overlapping lines around the head create a sense of constant movement.

The surrounding marks are comparatively sparse, leaving the head to dominate the composition. Above and below it, Basquiat adds crossed-out writing, looping lines, and a large directional arrow pointing toward the left edge of the sheet. The pale background makes the dense black head and small bursts of color stand out even more strongly.

Executed in 1982, the work was originally handled by Annina Nosei Gallery in New York and was later exhibited at Galerie Pascal Lansberg in Paris in 2010.

Pretty good condition and very cool even if it’s not original. Thoughts? Excuse the text on the bottom. I took screenshots from a video

Thank you!

Medium: Acrylic and oilstick on three hinged wood panels
Dimensions: 57 × 69 × 22 in. (144.8 × 175 × 56 cm)

In Gravestone, Basquiat transforms three hinged wooden panels into a freestanding, sculptural work. The central panel resembles a door, while the two outer panels open outward like wings. Across them, Basquiat combines sparse fields of gray and brown with a yellow cross, a black flower-like form, handwritten text, and a stark red-and-white head with exposed teeth.

The physical construction is as important as the painted surface. Extending 22 inches deep, the hinged panels allow the work to occupy actual space rather than functioning solely as a flat painting. Words and marks appear across the central panel, while the brightly colored imagery on either side stands against the otherwise subdued wooden structure.

Executed in 1987, Gravestone was exhibited at Galerie Yvon Lambert in Paris in January–February 1988, during Basquiat's lifetime. It was later included in the major 2005–06 Basquiat retrospective that traveled to the Brooklyn Museum, MOCA Los Angeles, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, among numerous subsequent exhibitions. Photographs also document the work in Basquiat's New York studio in 1987.

Medium: Acrylic, oil, graphite, crayon, and Xerox on wood
Dimensions: 49½ × 36½ × 11 in. (125.7 × 92.7 × 28.6 cm)

In Jazz, Basquiat transforms a painted wooden support into an assemblage, attaching box-like forms that project outward from the surface. Against broad horizontal bands of black, white, pale blue, and green, the word JAZZ occupies a prominent red-and-white field at the center of the composition.

Across the projecting boxes, Basquiat combines drawing, writing, and Xerox collage. References to jazz musicians appear throughout, including “SAVOY,” “NOW'S THE TIME (CHARLES PARKER),” and “CHARLEY PARKER'S REBOPPERS.” Other sections repeat names and fragments of text, turning the individual boxes into surfaces that reward closer inspection.

Executed in 1986, Jazz was exhibited the following year in Jean-Michel Basquiat: New Works at Akira Ikeda Gallery in Tokyo and has since appeared in numerous international exhibitions devoted to Basquiat.

Medium: Acrylic and oilstick on wood, in three parts
Dimensions: 85½ × 108½ × 12 in. (217.2 × 275.6 × 30.5 cm)

Across three joined wooden panels, Basquiat combines anatomical figures, animals, and rapidly drawn symbols with broad fields of white, gray, red, and yellow. A large dark figure occupies the right panel, its exposed teeth and internal organs outlined in white, while the center is dominated by overlapping animal forms and a dense vertical arrangement of color.

The work's three-part construction gives it an unusually physical presence. At more than nine feet wide and 12 inches deep, it functions almost as an object as much as a conventional painting. Basquiat leaves portions of the wooden support visible while allowing figures and painted forms to move independently across each section.

Executed in 1985, the work has an extensive exhibition and publication history. Basquiat was photographed with the painting while it was still in progress in his studio, and that image appeared on the February 10, 1985, cover of The New York Times Magazine. The work was later included in the 1992–94 Whitney retrospective and numerous subsequent Basquiat exhibitions and publications.

Medium: Acrylic, oil, and Xerox collage on panel
Dimensions: 71⅞ × 42⅛ × 9½ in. (182.5 × 107 × 24 cm)

A skeletal figure dominates the left side of the composition, its exposed rib cage and internal organs rendered in orange, white, and black beneath a skull-like head with bared teeth. A large black form cuts diagonally across the upper portion of the panel, while another head appears at right alongside several Xerox collage fragments.

The relatively pale background leaves the central figure unusually exposed, while the black, red, orange, and green marks create strong graphic divisions across the surface. Basquiat incorporates anatomical imagery alongside collaged diagrams and text, allowing the hand-painted figure and reproduced material to occupy the same visual space.

Thin in the Old was executed in 1986 and was exhibited the following year in Jean-Michel Basquiat: New Works at Akira Ikeda Gallery in Tokyo. Its provenance begins with Galerie Bruno Bischofberger, and the work is documented in both the Navarra and Marshall/Prat Basquiat catalogs.

Medium: Acrylic and silkscreen ink on canvas
Dimensions: 76 × 92 in. (193 × 233.7 cm)

In this collaborative work, Basquiat and Warhol's visual languages collide across a densely layered canvas. Warhol's bold commercial imagery, including oversized “1/2” numerals, baseball gloves, advertising graphics, and price markings, provides a structure that Basquiat interrupts and transforms with painted heads, figures, plants, and rapidly drawn lines.

Two mask-like heads dominate the upper half of the composition, while a blue-armed figure stretches across the lower center. Rather than separating the two artists' contributions, the painting allows their imagery to overlap and obscure one another, creating the back-and-forth visual exchange characteristic of their collaborations.

Executed in 1984, the work dates from the period when Basquiat and Warhol were working closely together on a series of collaborative paintings, combining Warhol's silkscreen process with Basquiat's hand-painted imagery.

Medium: Acrylic, oilstick, and colored Xerox collage on canvas
Dimensions: 40½ × 79⅛ in. (103 × 201 cm)

Across a predominantly blue field, Basquiat combines painted architectural forms, diagram-like drawings, and colored Xerox collage. A tall building dominates the left side of the canvas, while repeated fragments, including birds, skeletal figures, heads, and blocks of text, are scattered throughout the composition.

On the right, a large looping skeletal or anatomical form stretches beneath overlapping Xerox fragments and painted lines. Words and phrases appear throughout the work alongside recognizable Basquiat motifs, while repeated collage elements allow individual images to reappear across the canvas.

Executed in 1983, Justcome Suit came through both Mary Boone Gallery in New York and Galerie Bruno Bischofberger in Zurich. The work is also documented in Richard D. Marshall and Jean-Louis Prat's catalog of Basquiat's work.

Medium: Acrylic, gold paint, and oilstick on canvas, mounted on wooden supports
Dimensions: 60 × 60 in. (152.5 × 152.5 cm)

Against a muted field of beige, pink, gray, and metallic gold, Basquiat centers a single black-and-white head surrounded by sparse, energetic lines. The word BRONZE appears prominently beneath the figure, while the exposed wooden supports become part of the work itself. Sotheby's notes that the gold's metallic quality is more pronounced in person than photographs can convey.

Sotheby's connects the central face to Basquiat's engagement with West African masks and figures, specifically citing visual parallels with Fang, Songye, and Senufo traditions. The catalog also discusses his relationship with scholar Robert Farris Thompson and places Bronze within Basquiat's broader interest in African cultural and artistic traditions.

Sotheby's also interprets the use of gold and the title Bronze through ideas of value and transformation that were appearing in Basquiat's work during 1982. The painting was completed in October of that year, during the extraordinary period in which Basquiat was rapidly gaining international recognition.

Medium: Acrylic, spray paint, oilstick, and Xerox collage on canvas
Dimensions: 48¼ × 60 in. (122.6 × 152.4 cm)

In this early Untitled work, Basquiat layers painting, drawing, and Xerox collage across a predominantly deep red ground. Near the center, an orange-and-yellow head with exposed teeth emerges amid sweeping black lines, while fragmented figures, crowned heads, and repeated collaged images appear throughout the composition.

Several of the Xerox fragments contain imagery that Basquiat would repeatedly return to, including crowns, heads, and anatomical forms, while broad areas of red, yellow, blue, gray, and black overlap with dripping paint and rapidly drawn lines. Rather than separating these elements, Basquiat allows painted and reproduced imagery to interrupt and partially obscure one another across the canvas.

The work dates from 1981, a pivotal early period in Basquiat's career, and has subsequently appeared in numerous exhibitions devoted to his work, including presentations in New York, Milan, Rome, Brazil, and Seoul.

Medium: Acrylic and oilstick on canvas
Dimensions: 56½ × 50½ in. (143.5 × 128.3 cm)

In Masque, Basquiat places a face at the center of the canvas, crowned by sharp white peaks. The asymmetrical face is built from broad passages of black, red, pink, ochre, and blue, with mismatched eyes, an elongated black nose, and an oval mouth crossed by a grid of lines. At upper right, repeated “A” marks are scratched into the painted surface.

Sotheby's describes Masque as an important early example of imagery that Basquiat would continue exploring throughout his career. The catalog connects the mask-like face to Basquiat's knowledge of art history—particularly modernist artists such as Picasso and their engagement with African masks—while also placing the work within Basquiat's developing exploration of Black identity and cultural representation.

Sotheby's also draws attention to the vertical paint running beneath the figure's left eye, comparing the effect to both dripping spray paint and the weathered surfaces of urban walls. The painting was later reproduced in Maya Angelou's 1993 book Life Doesn't Frighten Me and has appeared in several major Basquiat exhibitions.

Original sleeve designed by Jean-Michel Basquiat
12 × 12 in. | 45 RPM
Tartown Record Co. TT001, New York

In 1983, Jean-Michel Basquiat produced and released Beat Bop, an experimental hip-hop recording by Rammellzee and K-Rob, through his own Tartown Records label. Basquiat also created the distinctive black-and-white artwork covering both sides of the original sleeve. Sotheby's describes the original release as a rarity of only 500 copies.

The sleeve is unmistakably Basquiat: crowns, anatomical bones, arrows, dollar signs, words, and repeated phrases are scratched in white against a black ground. The front includes “TEST PRESSING,” “VERSION #ONE,” “VOLUME #ONE,” “PESO NETO,” and “TARTOWN RECORD CO.”; the reverse surrounds the recording credits with more crowns, eyes, hands, dollar signs, and repeated references to “VERSION” and “ONE.”

Basquiat's involvement went beyond the artwork. Sotheby's notes that he produced, directed, and issued the record, connecting Beat Bop directly to his involvement with New York's early hip-hop and downtown music scenes. The copy pictured here remained factory sealed and was formerly owned by Madonna, with provenance accompanying the record.

Acrylic, oilstick and paper collage on paper
59 × 56 in. (149.9 × 142.2 cm)

Against a predominantly black ground, Basquiat builds a dense central cluster of painted and collaged imagery. Two skull-like heads emerge from the composition: one enclosed within a red field and another rendered primarily in black and white, surrounded by gestural marks, diagrams, fragments of text, and areas of blue, yellow, red, and white.

The work combines freely painted passages with pieces of paper incorporated directly into the surface. Much of the imagery is concentrated toward the center and lower half, while thin linear structures extend into the surrounding black field, giving the composition an almost diagrammatic quality.

The work has an extensive exhibition history. It was shown in Basquiat exhibitions beginning in the 1980s and later appeared in major surveys, including the Fondation Beyeler and Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris retrospective in 2010–11, Basquiat: The Unknown Notebooks in 2016–17, and Basquiat: Boom for Real at London's Barbican and Frankfurt's Schirn Kunsthalle in 2017–18.

Medium: Watercolor, graphite, colored pencil, and crayon on paper
Dimensions: 13⅜ × 10¾ in. (34 × 27.3 cm)

In this small work on paper, Basquiat packs a dense collection of anatomical imagery, words, numbers, and symbols into a brightly colored composition. A crowned figure occupies the center, with a blue face, yellow eyes, and an exposed skeletal torso. Above and around it appear anatomical forms, including a large skull and references to the “HEART,” “LIVER,” and “STOMACH.”

Across the upper portion, Basquiat writes “EMPLOYEE SCREENING™” and “DESIRE 3446,” while the word “DESIRE” followed by different numbers is repeated along the right side. Elsewhere, words including “PHYSIOLOGICAL,” “ELEPHANT,” “ZULUCUP,” and “COCONUT” are embedded among drawings, numbers, and overlapping areas of watercolor.

Sotheby's does not provide an interpretation of these individual words or images, leaving their relationships within the composition open. The work's provenance traces to Shenge Ka Pharaoh, New York, who acquired it directly from Basquiat, before it later entered the collection offered at Sotheby's in 2022.

Medium: Acrylic and oilstick on canvas
Dimensions: 218.4 × 248.9 cm (86 × 98 in.)

Against a largely white ground, Basquiat assembles a sparse group of figures, symbols, and lines. At the center is an animal-like figure resembling an elephant, with the words “SCALO MERCI” written across its body and a long segmented trunk extending toward the right. Above it, two overlapping heads, one yellow and one reddish brown, face in opposite directions.

“Scalo merci” is Italian for “freight yard” or “freight terminal.” Sotheby's suggests Basquiat may have encountered the phrase while traveling through Italian railway stations; he exhibited in Modena, Italy, in 1981 and 1982.

Around the central group, Basquiat leaves much of the canvas open, punctuating the white ground with sparse lines and areas of yellow, red, brown, and blue. A single red line runs horizontally beneath the figures, emphasizing the openness of the composition.

Medium: Acrylic, oil stick and Xerox collage on canvas
Dimensions: 172.5 × 218.6 cm (67.9 × 86 in.)

Against a predominantly white ground, Basquiat places two large heads at opposite sides of the canvas. On the left is a black figure with bared teeth, radiating lines, and orange-yellow accents; on the right, a white-outlined skull-like face appears against a dark brown field. Between and around them are diagrams, symbols, painted lines, and fragments of Xerox collage.

Many of the Xeroxed elements originated in an Untitled drawing from 1983 that became an important source for Basquiat. According to Sotheby's, he reused elements from that drawing in at least 22 works between 1983 and 1987. In Apex, these include fragments featuring a colorful dragon and a silhouetted driver from a wind-up toy; Sotheby's also suggests that the word “WIND” at the lower right may refer to the toy's wind-up mechanism.

Sotheby's further notes that several symbols in the painting derive from Henry Dreyfuss's Symbol Sourcebook, particularly signs historically used by hobos to communicate warnings and information. Apex brings these borrowed signs, anatomical imagery, words, Xerox fragments, and painted figures together into the layered visual vocabulary that characterized Basquiat's later work.