Jean-Michel Basquiat, twenty years old, arms wide open in the basement studio that launched him. The photo is Annina Nosei's gallery, 1981 — 100 Prince Street, SoHo. Nosei had seen his work that year in Diego Cortez's "New York/New Wave" at P.S. 1, gave him a spot in her group show "Public Address" alongside Keith Haring, Jenny Holzer and Barbara Kruger, and handed him this basement to paint in. What he made there carried him to his first American solo show by the following spring. Paint on his jeans, everything still ahead of him. This is the moment before the market knew his name — and knowing that moment, and the work that came out of it, is exactly what twenty-five years of specialization is for. 📷 Seth Tillett (1981). Courtesy basquiatofficial #JeanMichelBasquiat #Basquiat #SethTillett #ContemporaryArt #GuyHepner