Michelle Rosenfeld on Basquiat in his Loft

In 1994 art dealer Michelle Rosenfeld had a case against the Basquiat estate claiming she gave Jean-Michel a down payment for paintings she never received. In part of her testimony she described a visit to his loft,...

"It was early evening. The television was blaring, which was typical...and cartoons were on. He was walking around eating out of a can of Spam with the lid still attached. He was wearing, like baggie pull-on exercise pants...He had a couple assistants roaming around...There were many paintings all over. Some were unfinished, some were just canvases, but if you came in and saw all the paintings, it was overwhelming."

(Michelle Rosenfeld, p. 322-323 Basquiat, A Quick Killing In Art by Pheobe Hoban)

I find this to be very amusing. Amusing because this sounds very similar to a certain artist I know, (me), has my girlfriend could testify to. T.V. blaring, cartoons on, eating some ready made food product, wearing only comfortable baggie pants, with canvases all over the place stacked up. Yup, I'm guilty has charged, except I don't have any assistants running around, not yet anyway. For those of you that haven't seen the 1996 film Basquiat, starring Jeffrey Wright has a dead-on Basquiat, Benicio Del Toro, David Bowie has Andy Warhol, Dennis Hopper, and many others, it's a really well made and quality film.