aRM & haMMer II

1984's Arm and Hammer II was a collaboration between Jean Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol. Jean Basquiat was a neo expressionist artist of the late 1970's and 1980's. Black heritage and racism was a major theme in his work. His work depicted black americans' acceptance of the “institutionalized forms of whiteness and corrupt white regimes of power” years after the Jim Crow Era, had ended, his interests in black identity and historical and contemporary figures of blacks, and his questions of capitalism.

Basquiat and Warhol met in 1982 and started a collaboration in 1984 -1986. At times the collaborations went bad because Basquait like to rework, embellish, and paint over his work. Warhol didn't like how he would paint something and Basquait would paint over it. Here we see an example of how Warhol painted a  two side by side logo of Arm and Hammer brand.  Basquait painted over one them making the center logo a black man playing a saxophone . You can also see how Basquiat has turned the center into a coin by painting the words "Liberty"  on top and "1955" under the painting of the black musician. I agree with critic Trevor Fairbrother that the two halves of the picture is a portrayal of the inequality of American blacks and whites. The fact that the word liberty is next to the black musician in 1955, is sort of ironic to me since this was a time when Black Americans were still fighting for basic civil rights. I guess this is why it's said that his art was critical in the movement that led to the black liberation.