Since I was seventeen I thought I might be a star. I’d think about all my heroes, Charlie Parker, Jimi Hendrix… I had a romantic feeling about how these people became famous. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
Some days I can’t get an idea, and I think, ‘Man, I’m just washed up,’ but it’s just a mood. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
I have a painting where somebody’s holding a chicken, and underneath the chicken is somebody’s head. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
I have done only two portraits: one of the artist Francesco Clemente and another of Andy Warhol. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
I had some money, I made the best paintings ever. I was completely reclusive, worked a lot, took a lot of drugs. I was awful to people. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
I was a really lousy artist as a kid. Too abstract expressionist; or I’d draw a big ram’s head, really messy. I’d never win painting contests. I remember losing to a guy who did a perfect Spiderman. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
For a while, I was drawing on good paper, but now I’ve gone back to the bad stuff. I put matte medium on it. If you put matte medium on it, it seals up, so it doesn’t really matter. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
Occasionally, when I get mad at a woman, I’ll do some great, awful painting about her. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
I don’t listen to what art critics say. I don’t know anybody who needs a critic to find out what art is. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
The black person is the protagonist in most of my paintings. I realized that I didn’t see many paintings with black people in them. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
The country makes me more paranoid, you know? I think the crazy people out there are little crazier. – Jean-Michel Basquiat
