COURTESY THE BISHOP GALLERY
X Contemporary, a Miami Basel satellite fair, announced today that one of its exhibitors, Brooklyn’s Bishop Gallery, will show a collection of never-before-exhibited early works by Jean-Michel Basquiat at its next edition, which runs at the Nobu Hotel in Miami Beach from November 30 through December 4.
The pieces, which includes paintings, collages, and drawings, were made by Basquiat between 1979 and 1981 in the Manhattan apartment of his friend Lonny Lichtenberg, and will be curated for the fair by the artist’s onetime collaborator, Al Diaz. (They worked together on the SAMO graffiti that could be spotted throughout New York in the late 1970s.)
Prior to being sold “directly from [Lichtenberg’s] apartment” to a friend and collector, according to X Contemporary, they had “only been seen by a handful of individuals.” Probably more than a handful of people are going to see them in Miami!