King Pleasure Emporium to Open Alongside JEAN-MICHEL BASQUIAT: KING PLEASURE

The family of Jean-Michel Basquiat has announced the King Pleasure Emporium to open alongside the Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure© exhibition on the ground floor of RXR's landmark Starrett-Lehigh building in West Chelsea. The emporium is completely open to the public and will feature apparel, athletic wear, leather goods, stationary, pet accessories, housewares, and more. This includes collaborations with leading brands like Coach, who will revive select items from their capsule collection in celebration of the exhibition, Funko, CASETiFY, Corkcicle, Lucie Kaas, BOMBAY SAPPHIRE®, and more. Rizzoli Electa's accompanying book, also titled Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure©, will also be available. The book was authored by Jean-Michel's sisters Lisane Basquiat and Jeanine Heriveaux and his stepmother Nora Fitzpatrick. Tickets for Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure© are on sale now and available here. The King Pleasure Emporium will be located on the 26th St side of the Starrett-Lehigh Building.

The highly anticipated exhibition will feature over 200 never before and rarely seen paintings, drawings, ephemera and artifacts to give an intimate and multidimensional portrait of Jean-Michel that can only be told by his family. All of the work comes from the family's collection with the vast majority never having been exhibited previously. Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure© also features recreations of his NYC artist studio on Great Jones St. and the Michael Todd VIP Room of NYC's iconic Palladium nightclub for which Jean-Michel created two paintings. Renowned furniture design and manufacturing company Arper will provide furniture for the Michael Todd VIP Room recreation at the exhibition. Opening April 9th, the exhibition will span over 15,000-square-feet at RXR's Starrett-Lehigh Building.

The exhibition is produced by The Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat, with Lisane Basquiat and Jeanine Heriveaux serving as executive producers, in collaboration with Ileen Gallagher and ISG Productions Ltd. The family commissioned internationally acclaimed architect David Adjaye to be the exhibition's designer. He is the founder of Adjaye Associates, which operates with studios in Accra, London, and New York, and designed The Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture in Washington, DC. The exhibition's identity has been created by Abbott Miller of visionary design firm Pentagram. He has previously collaborated with cultural clients including the Guggenheim Museum, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Metropolitan Museum.

Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure©
is divided into the following themes:

1960 - INTRODUCTION- This section of the exhibition introduces audiences to Jean-Michel, his family and his heritage with several self-portraits on display.

KINGS COUNTY- This section provides an overview of Jean-Michel's childhood in Brooklyn and Puerto Rico. It will include an environmental evocation of Jean-Michel's childhood home, ephemera and works by Jean-Michel including newsletters from City-as-School, sketchbooks, personal notes and effects, home movies, interviews with family members, early drawings and sculptures.

WORLD FAMOUS- This section details Jean-Michel's meteoric early success and includes paintings and other ephemera.

IDEAL- 57 Great Jones Street Studio (August 1983) Studio Recreation- Jean-Michel's Great Jones Street studio will be recreated and include paintings, drawings, sketches, personal effects, his furniture, bicycle (his main method of transportation since he had trouble catching a cab), and his videotape and book collections.

ART GALLERY- This section will consist of several thematically arranged galleries with approximately 100 paintings and drawings. All works are owned by the Estate and most of them have never been seen before.

PALLADIUM- In 1985, Jean-Michel created two paintings, Nu-Nile and Untitled, for iconic NYC nightclub Palladium's VIP area, the Michael Todd Room. The exhibition will recreate this space including video and soundtrack.

PLACE JEAN-MICHEL BASQUIAT- This gallery will contain oral histories from members of Jean-Michel's family and a close circle of friends as well as posthumous awards and exhibitions.

Official Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure© Site
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Photo Credits: Christopher Makos