The Basquiat estate is fighting back against the release of nude images of Jean-Michel Basquiat.
The images, which show the late artist lying naked on a bed and smiling at the camera, were taken by his ex-girlfriend and Andy Warhol crony Paige Powell and shown at a 2014 exhibition, “Jean-Michel Basquiat Reclining Nude,” at the Suzanne Geiss Gallery.
The intimate images have appeared several places online, but editors of art and culture website Animal, who posted them back in January 2014, suddenly received an email this week from the estate’s lawyer, James P. Cinque, demanding the “offending” photos be removed because “they disparage Mr. Basquiat and are prurient in nature.”
The post — titled “And Now, Basquiat’s Actual B—s!” — was not taken down. Powell told Paper of the images, “He was very proud of his body and he’d been photographed nude before.
“I just know he would love these photos.” Animal shuttered in July, but is still visible online.
Creator Bucky Turco is now at ratter.com, which published the letter under the headline, “Why an angry attorney doesn’t want you to see Basquiat’s b—s.”