His works have received significant worldwide attention since his big entry into the mainstream Art-world in the late 1970's through to the 80's.
This attention has led to many of his works steadily getting more and more expensive as time passed with the best of them being priced at 600% of their original value. 'Horn Players' is one of such paintings.
Horn Players is an acrylic and oil stick painting on a triptych (three wooden panels) mounted on wood supports. The detail and artwork on the painting is very consistent with what observers of Basquiat's work have grown accustomed to in the over 2000 paintings and drawings he made during the course of his Art career.
These include portraits that go in tandem with plenty of the written words implying different references all done on the three joined panels. This painting possesses swaths of white paint on the canvas done against a dark background.
There's also a series of words that are constantly repeated. They include dizzy, ornithology, pree and teeth which are found spread out all over the painting.
Jean-Michel Basquiat always had a penchant for referencing the things he loved and the people he looked up to in his art. He would incorporate both words and portraits into a visual statement that was pretty clear to everybody who read them.
His works also incorporate elements of activism and a simmering defiance to the establishment. 'Horn Players' was no exception. The painting pays homage to two Jazz Artists whose music he loved. They included Charlie Parker, a saxophonist and Dizzy Gillespie, a Trumpeter.
The many words on 'Horn Players' all reference elements found in the music made by these legendary artistes. Ornithology for example is a reference to the world famous jazz composition by Charlie Parker that was instrumental in shaping his tastes as a fan of Jazz and as a composer as well.
Horn Players also has a repetition of the words 'chan' and 'pree' which both reference and pay homage to Charlie Parker's wife and daughter in that order. The use of words together with portraits was Jean-Michel Basquiat's enduring signature.
