Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Phooey is a sprawling, panoramic composition that encapsulates the artist’s ability to orchestrate chaos into a coherent and forceful visual statement. Stretching horizontally across the surface, the work unfolds like a wall of accumulated thoughts—part graffiti, part archive—where figures, symbols, text, and painterly gestures collide in rapid succession.

Rendered in Basquiat’s signature palette of black, white, ochre, blue, and acidic yellow, the composition layers skeletal figures, mask-like faces, crowns, and fragmented anatomical studies with blocks of handwritten text and crossed-out phrases. Words and references appear and disappear beneath aggressive overpainting, suggesting censorship, revision, and the instability of meaning. Commercial language, historical notes, and cryptic symbols coexist uneasily, reinforcing Basquiat’s critique of systems that categorize, brand, and erase.

The work’s scale amplifies its impact. Rather than guiding the viewer to a single focal point, Phooey demands lateral reading, mirroring the experience of scanning a city wall dense with posters, slogans, and tags. Repeated crown motifs punctuate the surface, asserting authority and resistance amid visual noise, while the raw, expressive figures evoke vulnerability, endurance, and cultural memory.

In its screen-printed form, Phooey preserves the immediacy of Basquiat’s mark-making while emphasizing the compositional ambition of the original image. The result is a work that feels restless and uncompromising—an expansive meditation on power, identity, and language that underscores Basquiat’s enduring relevance and his refusal to simplify complex histories into singular narratives. For more information or to buy Jean-Michel Basquiat's Phooey, contact our New York and London galleries using the form below.