Fernando Natalici

James White Mudd Club photograph (James Chance)

1979

Fela Kuti: A rare vintage collection of: 2 darkroom publicity photos circa ealry/mid 1980s. Each measuring 5x7 inches. 15+ 35mm transparencies of Fela performing live circa early/...

'Jean Michel Basquiat Dancing at The Mudd Club', New York City, 1979: This rare Basquiat photograph was taken from Nicholas Taylor’s well-documented portfolio exploring his friendship with Jean-Michel Basquiat - a friendship which began when both collaborated on the historic New York No Wave band, “GRAY” in the late 1970s; before the two briefly lived together in the East Village. Selections from Taylor's portfolio were most notably exhibited as part of the Basquiat retrospective at London's Barbican in 2017 and have been featured in numerous noteworthy publications on Basquiat. Archival inkjet print. 18 x 24 inches (including borders). Hand signed & numbered from an edition of 10. Provenance: Nick Taylor. Shipped flat using protective materials. Sold unframed. Lot 180 gallery is an authorized dealer rep of Nick Taylor. Taylor’s insightful photographs of a young Basquiat have been featured in numerous world renown publications, exhibits and documentaries surrounding Basquiat, among these: "How Music Powered Basquiat," The New York Times, 9/22/17 Sotheby's "Untitled, 1982;" catalog, May, 2017 Artnet, 9/18/17: Debunking Basquiat’s Myths The Mudd Club: Richard Boch, 2017 Jean-Michel Basquiat: 1981, The Studio of the Street; Diego Cortez King for a Decade: Jean Michel Basquiat; Taka Kawachi Recent Exhibitions featuring Taylor's work: Basquiat: Boom For Real, The Barbican, London, 2017/2018. New York, New Music 1980-86: Museum of the City of New York (2021). Nicholas Taylor: Further Background: Nicholas Taylor (American, b. 1953) is a renowned photographer and musician. Taylor moved to New York in 1977 to pursue a career as a photographer and it was through the vibrant New York art scene that he came to know the young artist, Jean-Michel Basquiat. It was, in fact, his intimate portfolio of photographs documenting his friendship with Basquiat that rocketed Taylor to fame. The two would collaborate in the No Wave band “Gray” before Taylor launched a successful career as a DJ famous for track-looping. His track “Suicide Mode” would later be used in the soundtrack for Julian Schnabel’s 1996 film “Basquiat." Circa 1981, Basquiat payed homage to Taylor by incorporating "Nick Taylor" and "DJ High Priest" (a title anointed him by Basquiat) into two separate drawings. While everyone else in the downtown tries to take credit, it was in fact Taylor who first introduced Jean-Michel to Madonna - at the Mudd Club - the very place this one of a kind image was captured. More on The Mudd Club: In the 1970s New York City, uptown had the glitz of Studio 54 and downtown had the Mudd Club: a legendary, downtown art scene venue known for pushing the boundaries of nightlife. The space became a natural collision of fashion, art, music, and literature. And the list of guests who walked through the front door reflected that scene: musicians like Grace Jones, Madonna, David Bowie, Mick Jagger, Debbie Harry, Fab Five Freddy, Marianne Faithfull, The Ramones, The Talking Heads, and Nico; fashion luminaries such as, Anna Sui, Betsey Johnson, and Gia Carangi...

This is a vintage silver gelatin photo of either Stan Lee or John Romita (I believe it is Romita but I am not sure) overlayed with a comic strip in a surrealist style. John Romita is an American comic-book artist best known for his work on Marvel Comics' The Amazing Spider-Man and for co-creating the character The Punisher. He was inducted into the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2002. He graduated from Manhattan's School of Industrial Art in 1947, having attended for three years after spending ninth grade at a Brooklyn junior high school Among his instructors were book illustrator Howard Simon and magazine illustrator Ben Clements, and his influences included comics artists Noel Sickles, Roy Crane, Milton Caniff, and later, Alex Toth and Carmine Infantino, as well as commercial illustrators Jon Whitcomb, Coby Whitmore, and Al Parker. Romita entered the comics industry in 1949 on the series Famous Funnies. "Steven Douglas up there was a benefactor to all young artists", Romita recalled. "The first story he gave me was a love story. It was terrible. All the women looked like emaciated men and he bought it, never criticized, and told me to keep working. He paid me two hundred dollars for it and never published it — and rightfully so". Romita was working at the New York City company Forbes Lithograph in 1949, earning $30 a week, when comic-book inker Lester Zakarin, a friend from high school whom he ran into on a subway train, offered him either $17 or $20 a page to pencil a 10-page story for him as uncredited ghost artist. "I thought, this is ridiculous! In two pages I can make more money than I usually make all week! So I ghosted it and then kept on ghosting for him", Romita recalled. "I think it was a 1920s mobster crime story". The work was for Marvel's 1940s forerunner, Timely Comics, which helped give Romita an opportunity to meet editor-in-chief and art director Stan Lee. Romita ghost-penciled for Zakarin on Trojan Comics' Crime-Smashers and other titles, eventually signing some "Zakarin and Romita". Romita went on to draw a wide variety of horror comics, war comics, romance comics and other genres for Atlas. His most prominent work for the company was the short-lived 1950s revival of Timely's hit character Captain America, in Young Men #24–28 (Dec. 1953 – July 1954) and Captain America #76–78 (May–Sept. 1954).[21] Additionally, Romita would render one of his first original characters, M-11 the Human Robot, in a five-page standalone science-fiction story in Menace #11 (May 1954). While not envisioned as an ongoing character, M-11 was resurrected decades later as a member of the super-hero team Agents of Atlas. He was the primary artist for one of the first series with a black star, "Waku, Prince of the Bantu" — created by writer Don Rico and artist Ogden Whitney in the omnibus title Jungle Tales #1 (Sept. 1954). The ongoing short feature starred an African chieftain in Africa, with no regularly featured Caucasian characters. Romita succeeded Whitney with issue #2 (Nov. 1954). In the mid-1950s, while continuing to freelance for Atlas, Romita did uncredited work for DC Comics before transitioning to work for DC exclusively in 1958. "I was following the DC [house] style", he recalled in 2002. "Frequently they had another artist do the first page of my stories. Eventually I became their romance cover...

From The Jon Gould Collection of Andy Warhol Photographs Each photo is unique and blind embossed “Andy Warhol” in the lower right corner Provenance: Gift of the Artist to Jon Goul...