Jean-Michel Basquiat Drawings: Notebooks, Works on Paper and the Act of Drawing

Jean-Michel Basquiat Drawings: Notebooks, Works on Paper and the Act of Drawing: introduction

Drawing runs through Jean-Michel Basquiat's work, from words entered in notebooks to large sheets made as independent objects and lines worked into paintings. It is tempting to make those activities one story of speed and spontaneity. The surviving objects tell a more varied story. A 1982 sheet in the Whitney combines oil stick and ballpoint pen; a different 1982 Untitled in MoMA uses felt-tip pen and oilstick; a thirty-two-sheet group recorded in a Paris museum checklist ranges across acrylic, pastel, pencil, charcoal and pen. A useful guide begins with the particular sheet and its source, not an assumption about how quickly it was made.^[1][2][3]

The paintings guide follows constructed and painted surfaces. The prints guide distinguishes original editions, later editions after works and ordinary reproductions. This page concentrates on drawing as an independent work, a notebook practice and a way of building other objects. Those categories meet, but a notebook page, a large oilstick sheet and a painted canvas are not automatically interchangeable.^[4][5]

Contents

1. A drawing is an object, not merely an early idea
2. The tools and supports in the records
3. Notebooks: words and images in sequence
4. The Daros Suite: a named group, not one drawing
5. Figures, bodies and sources
6. Heads on paper, seen together in 2026
7. Reading a sheet closely
8. Selected works and routes
9. Records and authenticity

A drawing is an object, not merely an early idea

Drawings are often described as steps toward finished paintings. Some can indeed help trace an image or phrase into a later work. Basquiat's notebooks contain recurring signs and written experiments that also appear in larger objects. Yet that relationship does not mean every page was a preparatory study for a known canvas. Brooklyn Museum's The Unknown Notebooks exhibition placed the notebooks alongside works on paper and paintings to examine connections among them, while its description stresses language and a developing visual vocabulary. It does not claim a one-to-one preparatory sequence for every page.^[4]

An independent drawing may have its own scale and exhibition history. MoMA's 1981 Untitled is oilstick on paper and measures 101.6 by 152.4 centimetres: a substantial sheet, not a pocket sketch. MoMA's record describes three figures and surrounding marks, but its interpretation of their spiritual meaning is the museum's reading, not a label for every crowned or haloed figure Basquiat drew. The record's object number, medium and dimensions identify this sheet more securely than its generic title does.^[6]

At the other extreme, a notebook's ruled paper and binding may shape how writing and image are arranged. Barbican's 2017 exhibition guide records Notebook One from 1980–81 with ink marker, wax crayon and ink on ruled pages, and Notebook Five from 1987 with a comparable range of materials. Both are identified as notebooks, not simply loose drawings later grouped together. Their sequence, page turns and occasional practical entries matter. A reproduction of one page can show a mark, but it cannot by itself show how that page sits among the rest.^[5]

The tools and supports in the records

“Drawings” is a collection category, not a single material. The Whitney's 1982 Untitled is classified as a drawing made with oil stick and ballpoint pen on an irregular sheet of paper. MoMA records another 1982 Untitled as felt-tip pen and oilstick on paper, and a 1985 Untitled as oilstick on paper. Their dates and object numbers establish three distinct works. The repeated title is a reason to check the record carefully, not evidence that one record describes all three.^[1][2][7]

Oil stick can make a dense, coloured line. A ballpoint pen or felt-tip can carry smaller letters and quick changes of direction. Paper can be ruled, loose, torn or mounted; it can receive paint, collage and writing in addition to a drawn mark. Those possibilities do not license a claim that Basquiat drew on “anything available.” The documented support is the useful fact. For example, the Paris museum's 2010 checklist identifies the Daros Suite as thirty-two sheets of paper, each 57 by 76.5 centimetres, with a group medium description spanning acrylic, oil pastel, pastel, pencil, charcoal and pen. It does not assign every one of those tools to every sheet individually.^[3]

The boundary between drawing and painting can be instructive. Barbican calls Untitled (Titian) a drawing in explanatory prose while its object label specifies oil stick on canvas. That is not a reason to rewrite the support as paper. It shows that “drawing” can refer to a method or a curatorial grouping while the object's physical description says something more specific. The Titian work guide should be consulted with that medium attached; the words, anatomy and symbols guide follows the source material used in such work.^[5]

Likewise, drawn lines inside In Italian belong to a mixed-media painting on two canvas panels, according to the Paris checklist. A striking contour does not turn the whole object into a work on paper. Museum labels sometimes choose different everyday terms for oil-based sticks and crayons; their wording should be retained or translated with care instead of flattened into a universal recipe for “Basquiat drawings.”^[3]

Notebooks: words and images in sequence

The Brooklyn Museum described Basquiat's notebooks from the late 1970s and early 1980s as containing handwritten text, pictograms, symbols and drawings. It connected early versions of familiar forms with poems, lists, wordplay and observations. Barbican's later exhibition included notebooks from 1980–81 and 1987, extending the visible record beyond a single youthful phase. Taken together, these sources support an account of notebooks as continuing places to work with language and image. They do not support a neat story in which notebook drawing ended once larger paintings began.^[4][5]

Words on a page can be read, but they also have size, spacing and a place in a sequence. A list can become a field of repeated shapes; an isolated name can interrupt a group of marks; a phrase can be revised without becoming invisible. The SAMO and the street guide explains Basquiat's earlier public-writing practice with Al Diaz. Notebook writing belongs in the same wider history of text, but it has a different setting and material form. Neither a wall inscription nor a notebook page should be called a mere caption for the paintings that followed.^[4][5]

Barbican's catalogue includes a 1981 authentication statement for one notebook signed by people close to Basquiat. That document is evidence for the history of the particular notebook in the exhibition; it is not a general rule that all genuine drawings must carry an Estate signature on the reverse. The Estate says its authentication committee disbanded in 2012 and no longer reviews applications. Claims about an automatic Estate stamp, or a simple test that proves a loose sheet genuine, should not be inferred from the existence of one documented notebook.^[5][8]

The Daros Suite: a named group, not one drawing

The 2010 Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris checklist identifies an Untitled Daros Suite of thirty-two drawings dating from 1982–83. The checklist gives a group size, shared sheet dimensions and a list of sheet names. King Alphonso appears in that list. So do 50¢ Piece and Titian. Their presence does not prove that every separately indexed Basquiat work with either title is the same Daros sheet. A title can recur, and a work on canvas needs to be distinguished from a sheet on paper.^[3][5]

That distinction is especially important for Titian. The Barbican's Untitled (Titian) is labelled 1982, oil stick on canvas. The Paris checklist's Titian is one named sheet within the 1982–83 Daros group on paper. Similar subject matter and names may invite comparison, but the different support descriptions rule out silently merging them. A catalogue can help a reader compare the objects only after each one has been correctly identified.^[3][5]

The suite also illustrates how a museum list should be used. It supplies evidence of a group and its component names. It does not, on its own, describe every sheet's precise imagery or the order in which they were drawn. Its group medium should not be repeated as if all thirty-two sheets used every listed substance. An individual page discussing King Alphonso needs the actual sheet image and any fuller object record before describing its colours, symbols or condition in detail.^[3]

The list also offers a lesson about catalogue structure. A suite title identifies a relationship among works; an individual sheet title helps distinguish a component within that relationship. The same words may circulate in a museum checklist, an exhibition label and a later online index with slightly different punctuation. A reader should keep the suite membership attached to the named sheet, rather than treating King Alphonso as a free-standing painting simply because its name looks similar to nearby canvas titles. Dimensions and support provide a second check when wording varies. For the Daros group, the Paris record establishes the shared paper format; a fuller sheet record would be needed to say more about one member's materials or later ownership.^[3]

Figures, bodies and sources

Drawing is a way to describe bodies in Basquiat's art, but anatomy is not a single code. Heads can be opened by lines, bodies can become skeletal, and a hand or foot may be marked with a borrowed technical word. Barbican displayed books relevant to his work, including a copy of Gray's Anatomy and a Leonardo volume, and its guide places art-history and anatomical references beside particular objects. This is evidence for the importance of source books. It does not establish that any historical anatomy plate was copied into a given drawing without an object-to-source comparison.^[5]

The Skull guide addresses a 1981 painting whose popular nickname can steer interpretation before the viewer has looked closely. The Untitled (Boxer) guide and music and boxing guide offer different human figures and named cultural subjects for comparison. None should be made into a generic diagram of Basquiat's own body. When a drawing includes a recognisable person or a name, identify the evidence for that identification; when it does not, describe the forms before attaching a biography.^[5][6]

Working from books, television and everyday printed culture could also produce a mark that feels close to copying while being rearranged within Basquiat's own page. Barbican records a 1985 film of him drawing in front of a television and shows books used as source material. That record is more specific than a cliché about a mind overflowing with random images. It gives a documented instance of looking, selecting and translating. A particular source for a particular line still needs to be demonstrated rather than assumed from the general studio context.^[5]

Later works on paper are easy to overlook when the story focuses on his early notebooks and the highly visible paintings of 1982–83. MoMA's 1985 Untitled is a clear counterexample. It is catalogued as oilstick on paper and held in the museum's drawings and prints department, with its own dimensions and accession number. Barbican's Notebook Five is dated 1987. These two records have different functions and settings, yet together they show that drawing remained present after the period of Basquiat's first major exhibitions. They do not establish a uniform late style. The page and the notebook should be inspected individually before a line, colour or phrase is used to describe a whole period.^[5][7]

Heads on paper, seen together in 2026

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art's 2026 Headstrong exhibition brought a substantial, little-seen group of Basquiat's heads on paper into a dedicated museum presentation. The museum dates most to 1981–83 and describes oilstick as a principal material. Many stayed with Basquiat during his lifetime. That history matters when judging their place in his practice: public familiarity with a handful of painted heads does not measure the range of heads he made on paper.^[9]

Louisiana says these sheets were not studies for paintings or other media. This is a curatorial assessment of the exhibited group, rather than a rule for every drawing Basquiat made. It supports looking at the individual papers as complete objects, attending to scale, colour and pressure before searching for a later canvas they might explain. The exhibition also challenges the expectation that each Basquiat head must carry a crown or a cloud of words. The museum describes many of these sheets as almost free of text and his familiar symbols.^[9]

That relative spareness makes the work of the drawn face easier to notice. An opening at the eye, an uneven boundary or a broken contour can change whether a head seems closed, exposed or in motion. Louisiana describes variation from skull-like and anatomical heads to highly stylised faces, rather than a single prototype repeated across the group. Its named examples include Mosquito Coil (1982) and Head (1982–83); Untitled (Bust) (1984), made with acrylic and collage on paper with tape, also appears in the exhibition material. Those titles and media should be kept with their own objects, not transferred to the Broad's 1981 canvas commonly called Skull.^[9]

The Brooklyn Museum's 2015 notebooks exhibition and Louisiana's later heads presentation illuminate different kinds of paper practice. Notebook pages can hold lists, short texts, pictograms and provisional variations; the oilstick heads foreground an image that can stand without explanatory writing. Neither institution's selection defines all of Basquiat's works on paper. Together they make “drawing” a more precise question about a sheet's format, use, history and viewing conditions, rather than a synonym for a rough draft.^[4][9]

Two catalogued sheets add a further comparison across time and format. The University of Michigan Museum of Art holds Mother© (1981), a crayon drawing on paper, accession 1985/2.19. Its description locates a ladder above the word “Mother” and a copyright sign. That small number of elements makes the relation between word and image the subject of looking: the ladder does not illustrate a standard dictionary meaning of “mother,” and the written word does not merely caption a picture of a person. The museum's recorded sheet size, about 60.8 × 45.4 cm, helps preserve its identity alongside other early text-image sheets.^[10]

The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Untitled (1985), object 1992.368.1, is a different kind of assembled paper work. Its medium record names graphite, coloured pencil, oilstick, acrylic and torn and pasted papers on paper; the museum gives 74.3 × 106.7 cm. Its description identifies all-capital words on notepaper slips and delicate animal-skeleton drawings. Those details show that writing and drawing could meet through physically attached pieces, not only through marks made on one continuous surface. They also counter a timeline in which text-image experimentation ended once Basquiat became known for large canvases.^[11]

Reading a sheet closely

First, identify the object. A useful record gives title, date, materials, support, dimensions, collection or provenance, and an accession or catalogue reference. These details separate MoMA's 1981, 1982 and 1985 Untitled works, and the Whitney's 1982 sheet, despite their shared title. The image can then be studied in relation to the object's size and materials. A small online thumbnail can hide paper edges, changes in pressure and distinctions between ink and oilstick.^[1][2][6][7]

Next, notice the relation between word and figure. Is a name close to a body, repeated across a page or crossed by another mark? Does colour define a form or interrupt it? Where a line seems to sketch an outline, is it part of a separate drawing or part of a multi-panel painting? The answer can change what counts as the edge of the work. The same attention applies to apparently empty space. A broad paper margin may be an active part of a composition; it is not proof of an unfinished study.^[3][5]

It also helps to separate what the record says from what the viewer proposes. The record may securely give a date and medium while saying little about the reason for an image. A visual resemblance can be described as a resemblance, then tested against books, notes, exhibition material or the artist's own statements. An interpretation need not be abandoned because direct testimony is absent, but its degree of certainty should be clear. That habit is particularly valuable with pages whose words seem to invite a quick literal reading.^[4][5]

Finally, compare a drawing with a painting only after each object is clear. A crown in a notebook, a crown in a large work on paper and the crowned figure in Pez Dispenser may share a shape without doing the same thing. The crowns guide follows such comparisons. A repeated motif can illuminate change across media, but it cannot substitute for the particular page's scale, words and date.^[4][5]

Selected works and routes

These records offer distinct entry points into Basquiat's drawing practice. The table separates an individual object from a group and marks the support given by the cited institution. It is a selection for orientation, not a catalogue of every known drawing.^{[1][2][3][5][6][7]}

The King Alphonso guide is the local work-specific route anchored by a documented drawing identity. Other local work routes in this cluster include paintings with prominent drawn marks or names shared with drawings; their presence in the navigation should not turn them into works on paper. The biography supplies the career chronology, while the artist guide connects works, methods and contexts.^[3][5]

Records and authenticity

The old idea that unsigned drawings are suspect while Estate-stamped sheets are safe compresses a difficult object-history question into a false rule. The Estate's FAQ explicitly says its authentication committee closed in 2012. For readers researching a drawing, the public object record, exhibition history, provenance and published catalogue context are more responsible starting points. They can strengthen an identification; none should be represented as a quick authentication service. This guide is about looking and documenting, not valuing or certifying works.^[8]

Frequently Asked Questions

References and further reading

1. Whitney Museum of American Art, Untitled, 1982, object 91.16, classification, medium, dimensions and exhibition history.
2. Museum of Modern Art, Untitled, 1982, object 439.1986, felt-tip pen and oilstick on paper; surfaced in MoMA's current artist index and collection search.
3. Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris, 2010–11 Basquiat press dossier and exhibition checklist, especially pp. 17–18 for the Daros Suite and In Italian.
4. Brooklyn Museum, Basquiat: The Unknown Notebooks exhibition description, published in its 2015 advance exhibition schedule.
5. Barbican Centre, Basquiat: Boom for Real large-print exhibition guide, especially art-history, notebooks and screen sections.
6. Museum of Modern Art, Untitled, 1981, object 137.1991, oilstick on paper, dimensions and museum interpretation.
7. Museum of Modern Art, Untitled, 1985, object 1246.2005, oilstick on paper, dimensions and licensing information.
8. Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat, FAQ, authentication-committee closure and artwork reproduction rights.
9. Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Basquiat – Headstrong exhibition account, 30 January–17 May 2026, on the 1981–83 oilstick heads, their retention by the artist, independent status and relative absence of text and symbols.
10. University of Michigan Museum of Art, Mother© (1981), accession 1985/2.19, crayon on paper, dimensions and curatorial description of ladder, word and copyright sign. The museum's image use terms do not grant local republication.
11. Metropolitan Museum of Art, Untitled (1985), object 1992.368.1, medium, dimensions and description of notepaper slips with animal skeletons; image is rights-restricted.