They say Brooklyn is the city of diversity and color. But omigod nothing says that better than two events that are going on right now on Eastern Parkway:

The cherry blossom extravaganza at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden AND the Jean-Michel Basquiat show at the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

My  husband and I took a little lunchtime sojourn to the gardens yesterday and whoa we’re glad we did. Not only are the cherry blossoms, those wild, sexy sirens of horticultural glory in full bloom but so are the lilacs and the tulips.

It is a color extravaganza over there. A veritable visual bounty for those who love to savor color, composition and fragrance.

Stick your nose in a lilac blossom. It’s a totally acceptable thing to do this week at the Gardens. Get close and sniff the glorious nose gay that is a blooming lilac. Go soon and swoon, they don’t last long and their fragrance, not to mention their sultry droopiness, are worth the price of admission. Ahhhh.

We then decided to check out the Basquiat show at the BMA that neither of us had see though it was very high on our "Let’s not miss another great NY art show that’s why we live in New York list."

We figured, we’re here already, let’s get our buttocks over there.

The EXPLOSION of COLOR. The SUCKER PUNCH of expression – color, cartoon, text, collage, stream of consciousness, Griot, jazz, anger, boxing, humor, identity, pain, and the power of diversity.

The Brooklyn-born son of a Haitian dad and a Puerto Rican mom, Basquiat was a student at St. Ann’s School and became a graffiti artist known as SAMO (for same old shit) in the late 1970’s.  He rose to fame in the 1980’s after befriending Andy Warhol and painting voraciously and passionately until his death of an accidental overdose in the late 1980’s at the age of 27.

My husband met him back then and says that while he’s a great artist he was a real pain-in- the-ass person. He saw him spontanously create a SAMO grafitti in a friend’s kitchen. Basquiat started out on the wall but when he ran out of room he sprayed over pots, pans, and the refrigerator. He then fell asleep in a bean bag chair.

A few years later my husband saw him wheel his bike into the Mary Boone Gallery and then roll it across the space so carelessly that a gallery worker had to rush to catch  it
before it hit a painting by another notable 1980’s artist. Everybody in
the gallery was like, WTF?

That aside, what a sucker punch of a show. In fact, there is a painting right at the entrance of the show called "SUCKER PUNCH."

Eastern Parkway awaits. What a duo. Stick your nose in a lilac blossom and then peel open your eyes to the wonder of Jean-Michel.

You just gotta.