Paris, France - Enter into a 5-story private mansion on the Avenue Matignon, one of the French capital's gallery rows, to discover a part of the iconic 1980s New York art scene. This is an authentic flash back to downtown Manhattan in the late 1970s and the 1980s. This is when Andy Warhol's Factory flourished and Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat changed the face of contemporary art for good. It was a time for Lou Reed, Nico, The Velvet Underground, and long nights and early mornings spent at Max's Kansas City and CBGB and of course The Factory.
The Bastok Lessel Gallery is currently taking us back to that era in a show that brings together some 20 paintings and works on paper by those three artists who would change the art scene forever, becoming icons and friends in the process: Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring. The show is being held in the gallery's two locations, Paris and Dubai. The works on show were created in a time when it was all about downtown Manhattan, lower Broadway, the East Village and Alphabet City. Their paths would cross in New York and they would die there, as well, Basquiat in 1988 when he was 28 from an overdose, Haring in 1990 from AIDS complications at the age of 32 and Andy Warhol in 1987 following gall bladder surgery, at the age of 58. They invented their own artistic codes and languages so evident in their respective works. Haring with his thick, fluid lines, Basquiat with his lists, diagrams and symbols, and Warhol with his series and soup cans. They were intertwined with Warhol and his Pop Art leading the way. Haring once said, « Andy's life and work made my work possible. Andy set the precedent for the possibility for my art to exist ».
Bastok Lessel reflects the names of the gallery's two partners, Tom-David Bastok and Dylan Lessel who are highly established names on the secondary art market. They are known for the museum quality of their exhibitions and the current show, Basquiat, Haring, Warhol, is in no way an exception. ©Trish Valicenti for The Gourmet Gazette. 8 Av. Matignon, 75008 Paris, France. Tel: + 33 (0)1 89 16 76 60. https://bastoklessel.com/ And In Dubai in the DFIC, Dubai's International Financial Center
