Untitled (Pollo Frito)
painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat
Untitled (Pollo Frito) is a painting created by American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat in 1982. The artwork was sold at Sotheby's for $25.7 million in November 2018.
History
Jean-Michel Basquiat executed Untitled (Pollo Frito) in 1982, the year he fully gained legitimacy and recognition in the international art scene. He received his first American solo exhibition at the Annina Nosei Gallery in New York, followed by the Larry Gagosian Gallery in Los Angeles and Bruno Bischofberger's gallery in Zurich. He also received an invitation to attend the Documenta 7 exhibition in Kassel as the youngest artist to ever participate.
In 1982, Fay Gold, an art dealer from Atlanta, spotted Untitled (Pollo Frito) at the Annina Nosei Gallery during a trip to New York City. She had intended to buy a diamond bracelet with the $5,000 her husband gave her for her birthday, but, instead, she bought the painting. In 1985, Gold went to Basquiat's Great Jones Street studio and invited him to do a show at her gallery. He sold her a group of eleven drawings for $16,500 and later traveled to Atlanta for the opening at the Fay Gold Gallery in February 1986.
In 2002, Gold sold Untitled (Pollo Frito) for around $1 million.
“Untitled (Pollo Frito)” enters the record as painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Untitled, Pollo and Frito can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Untitled (Pollo Frito)” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Untitled, Pollo and Frito provides the most credible route into that argument.
Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q105085965. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1982, 2018, 1985 and 1986.
Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.
- Identifying works and editions
- Tracing reception history
- Finding collection records
The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Untitled (Pollo Frito)”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Untitled (Pollo Frito) primary sources, Untitled (Pollo Frito) archive and Untitled research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Untitled (Pollo Frito)”?
- Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
- How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Untitled (Pollo Frito)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.