Die, OK

Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat travel through time in a nihilistic soda can.

28 years ago, in 1995, a Coke can spoke to an artist on the street. ‘Die, OK,’ it said from its spot in the gutter, in a tone as flat as its condition. Was this a statement or a demand? The artist did not know. But he knew what it was to be broken, to be crushed, and so he picked it up and put it in his pocket.

38 years ago, in 1985, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol collaborated on a series of paintings fusing capitalism and primitivism, culture and counterculture, sterility and prolixity. The resulting works juxtaposed Warhol's meticulous, machinelike screen printing with Basquiat’s riotous, gritty graffiti, none more so than ‘Bananas’ and ‘Untitled (General Electric II)'.

Nineteen ninety-five. Nineteen eighty-five. 28 years ago. 38 years ago. A man with a coke can. Two men and their bananas. What are we to make of it? The artist wondered, too. But he did not act. Failed to solve the riddle.

Three decades later, when the young man was no longer young, he finally found the answer, fa…