Jean Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child was a documentary directed by Tamera Davis to highlight the astonishing painter Jean Michel Basquiat. Jean Michel Basquiat was born in Brooklyn and by age 17 he was found living homeless in lower Manhattan, NY. He was a graffiti artist and became a full- fledged painter. Throughout his life he developed real friendships with other artists, including Andy Warhol. This documentary features interviews conducted by Basquiat’s friend, Tamera Davis and revealed how the young artist dealt with being a black artist in the late 70s and early 80’s New York. Basquiat is now recognized as one of the most influential artists of the 20th century and exhibits in museums all over the world.
An aspect of the movie that was so intriguing was the use of interviews that were filmed with the artist himself. This was a neat device to allow Basquiat to speak for himself and be a part of a project that celebrates his life. This interview was recorded at the height of his fame; allowing viewers to see Basquiat in his glory days when he had inner confidence and good lucks.
The approach of this film seemed to be very ironic. I think this because Basquiat continues to say in his interviews that he doesn’t think about his paintings and there is no motivation behind them, instead they just come “automatic” and his inner child comes out. Throughout the movie hundreds of Basquiat’s paintings are shown, some are only on the screen for about a second. Davis allows you to view them very quickly without being able to consider them or have any feeling behind them before viewing the next one. This reminds me of how Basquiat did his paintings because he was constantly changing or crossing out something on his paintings to get a final piece. Even though this seems as an effective aspect of the movie and shows Basquiat’s enormous artistic talent, it was one of the parts I didn’t enjoy about the film. By the end of the movie I had almost forgotten about every painting shown because there were so many and they were only on the screen for a short amount of time. I would have preferred to see just a couple of his works of art and had the artists and friends dissect those paintings and talk about the importance and the impact they had.
Another feature of the movie that I did not enjoy was that even though his hardships were mentioned they were not taken into full detail. They were often just mentioned without much explanation. For example, the embattled relationship with his father, his drug issue, and his fallout with Andy Warhol. With more clarification about these events, we might be able to understand and further investigate his death, meanings behind his paintings, and what influenced him to become a painter. I believe Davis didn’t want to disclose this information to its full extent because she didn’t want viewers to interpret Basquiat in a bad way or to remember him for his hardships. She further tried to present this documentary as a celebration through the music. The cheerful and optimistic music in the beginning and the end contributed to this. These choices helped to shape the tone of the movie. The music shifted the depressing ending to a merry and reassuring mood of all the great things Basquiat accomplished in life.
Davis presented things to viewers that we might not have known. For example, many people are familiar with his paintings, his relationship with Andy Warhol, his overdose but many viewers may not know that he played clarinet in a band called Gray. This helped the documentary be successful because it allows viewers to connect with a different side of Basquiat and learn these other special talents he had.
“Nobody loves a genius child.” These are the words of Langston Hughes’s poem used in the beginning of the documentary as a hyperbolic epigraph, meaning Davis used these words to shape the theme for the movie. I thought this was a very powerful and important poem that stimulated attention. Basquiat was a genius but he always felt betrayed and that his work wasn’t good enough. He then turned to drugs which led to his death. When Tamara Davis referred to this quote, I think she wanted us to understand that the meaning behind it was that Basquiat didn’t love himself and didn’t see himself as a genius or as his fans perceived him. This quote becomes relevant to many celebrities and famous people. They usually have incredible talents and are usually the center of much backlash. Most of the time this causes the person to become a danger to themselves and they turn down a bad path or their life ends in a tragedy. Hopefully one day this will change and there can be less incidents and tragedies of brilliant stars.
All in all, The Radiant Child is a valuable film. It allows us to see Basquiat’s art in a cultural context with zest, because of the music and great enthusiasm about Basquiat from the interviewees in this movie. Also, this movie allowed viewers to view his pictures as blazingly alive. This movie combined instructive information with a narrative story that was enjoyable to watch.
