Press

Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child

August 6-12, Daily at 7 and 9pm

Director: Tamra Davis
Producers: Tamra Davis, David Koh, Lilly Bright, Stanley Buchthal, Alexis Spraic Featuring: Jean-Michel Basquiat, Julian Schnabel, Larry Gagosian, Bruno Bischofberger, Tony Shafrazi, Fab 5 Freddy, Jeffrey Deitch, Glenn O'Brien, Maripol, Kai Eric, Nicholas Taylor, Fred Hoffmann, Michael Holman, Diego Cortez, Annina Nosei, Suzanne Mallouk, and Rene Ricard Run
Time: 94 minutes
Rating: Unrated
Official Web Sites: www.jeanmichelbasquiattheradiantchild.com, www.arthousefilmsonline.com

*Director Tamra Davis is available for interviews, as are many of the people featured in the film. Please contact ryan @ nwfilmforum . org with any requests.

ABOUT THE FILM
Centered on a rare interview that director and friend Tamra Davis shot with Basquiat over twenty years ago, this definitive documentary chronicles the meteoric rise and fall of the young artist.  In the crime-ridden NYC of the 1970s, he covers the city with the graffiti tag SAMO. In 1981 he puts paint on canvas for the first time, and by 1983 he is an artist with “rock star status.”  He achieves critical and commercial success, though he is constantly confronted by racism from his peers. In 1985 he and Andy Warhol become close friends and painting collaborators, but they part ways and Warhol dies suddenly in 1987. Basquiat’s heroin addiction worsens, and he dies of an overdose in 1988 at the age of 27. The artist was 25 years old at the height of his career, and today his canvases sell for more than a million dollars.  With compassion and psychological insight, Tamra Davis details the mysteries that surround this charismatic young man, an artist of enormous talent whose fortunes mirrored the rollercoaster quality of the downtown scene he seemed to embody.


MAKING THE FILM
This documentary has been a labor of love for director Tamra Davis. She was very good friends with Basquiat in the eighties. They met through a mutual friend and bonded over their love of cinema. Tamra was an aspiring filmmaker and Basquiat asked her to film him. She collected, over a few years, some of the only footage of the artist, including the only long, comprehensive interview with him.  After Basquiat passed away, she decided to put her footage away. It was too painful for her to do anything with it, and she also was sensitive to his feeling that all his close friends were taking advantage of him/his fame. It wasn’t until 20 years later, in 2004, that Tamra edited her Basquiat footage into a short film, at the request of one of the curators at MoCA, who was hosting a large Basquiat retrospective. The short film was entered to Sundance in 2006. David Koh, producer, saw Tamra’s short and approached her about making a feature out of it. In 2010, JEAN-MICHEL BASQUIAT: THE RADIANT CHILD had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival.



INTERESTING FACTS

1.     Shepard Fairey (the artist) designed our poster and did the graphics in the film.

2.     Tamra Davis is married to Mike D of the Beastie Boys. Mike D and Ad-Rock did the music for the film.

3.     Tamra Davis previously directed Billy Madison, Half Baked and Crossroads, yes with Britney Spears.

 

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