pope visit york 1982

The Pope arrives at Knavesmire in 1982

More than 2,000 pilgrims had spent the night on Knavesmire, the site of his visit. Thousands began to join them from the break of dawn onwards. Many had walked several miles after leaving their cars on Clifton airfield, even though dozens of park-and-ride services had been laid on.

Some of the early-birds took part in a special Mass that began at 7.30am. Meanwhile, the 26,000 who arrived by special trains made their way to Knavesmire in a vast human column.

On the way, they could buy a whole range of official souvenirs. Profits were earmarked to help offset the £1 million spent on the York visit.

At the time, the papal visit was the biggest outdoor event York had seen in years.

Onlookers recall that it seemed the whole city had gathered on the racecourse that day.

Shops closed down for the day, traffic stopped flowing and the papal visit became the focus of everyone's attention.

Worshippers from St Aelred's in York

It was a visit that many thought would never happen.

Just a year earlier, the Pope had been gravely ill in hospital after being gunned down by a fanatic in Rome.

And the outbreak of the Falklands War also threw the trip into doubt.

His Holiness appealed to both Britain and Argentina to bring the conflict to a peaceful end. Then, after a few anxious days, he confirmed the visit was on.

The Pope arrived on British soil at Gatwick Airport on May 28, 1982. He bent to kiss the tarmac, by now a trademark of his papacy, before heading to take Mass at Westminster Cathedral.

Over the next three days, the Pope's schedule was relentless. He visited the Queen, held a service at Canterbury Cathedral, took Mass at Wembley, Coventry Airport and Liverpool Cathedral, and toured many destinations in between.

On May 31, the Pope spent the morning in Manchester. When his helicopter touched down on York turf, it was 2.08pm- some 23 minutes late.

He embraced the Archbishop of York, Dr Stuart Blanch, before climbing into the Pope-mobile to tour among the huge crowd.

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The Enduring Legacy of John Paul II’s 1982 Visit to Britain

“For the first time in history,” said Pope St. John Paul II after he stepped off the airplane, “a Bishop of Rome sets foot on English soil.”

Joanna Bogle, February 16, 2022 – National Catholic Register

In 2022, the Church in Britain marks an important milestone in its long history: This May, it will be 40 years since the first visit of a pope to Britain.

And it almost didn’t happen.

There had been months of preparation, much debate and discussion in the media, elaborate rehearsals by choirs and cathedrals and Catholic organizations, the hiring of massive venues, including London’s famous Wembley Stadium — and then the Falklands war broke out, and the whole idea of a papal visit was called into question.

Most people in Britain knew little or nothing about the Falkland Islands, a small British colony in the South Atlantic. In April 1982, Argentinian forces invaded the Falklands, swept the small British garrison aside, and announced that the islands were now in Argentinian control.  Britain responded by sending a Royal Navy task force, and effectively the British were at war.

As part of the anniversary, I have been dipping into archives and discovering the inside story of the emergency meetings and messages that went back and forth between Britain and Rome as the crisis deepened and the papal visit was at risk of being abandoned. There must have been a great deal of prayer. Pope John Paul II, of course, led the prayers for peace, and British and Argentinian bishops were summoned to Rome, where he celebrated a Mass with them all. And then came the climax of the last-minute rescue operation to save the situation: He flew to Argentina for a swiftly arranged papal visit, before going on to Britain.

It was clear throughout that the Pope was not only neutral but that he was vigorously promoting peace: This was his consistent message, and it never wavered. On this basis, he was able to fly to London’s Gatwick Airport, where, as planned in detail over the previous months, a large crowd, drawn from Catholic parishes across Surrey and Sussex, had gathered to greet him. I was among that crowd. I remember the early-morning start and the excitement as we all arrived in a chartered bus, and then the wait at the airport, where the Duke of Norfolk — by long-established tradition Britain’s senior Catholic layman — greeted the Pope at the airport steps.

This was not, it was emphasized, an official visit. This was a pastoral visit of the Pope to Britain’s Catholics. So no formal representative of the queen was at the airport, and there were no government officials. There was music, and we sang a welcoming hymn. Then there were speeches — and the history was made. The Pope summed it up when he proclaimed, “For the first time in history, a Bishop of Rome sets foot on English soil.”

In its own way, the tragedy of the Falklands War — more than 800 men, British and Argentinian, would eventually lose their lives in the fighting — helped to create a situation where old antagonisms dating back to the Reformation in Britain seemed to dwindle away. The papal visit became a true opportunity for a message of peace and goodwill, with anti-Catholicism of the old sort somehow at variance with a general recognition of the needs of the modern era. The whole visit had, in any case, been planned with ecumenical goodwill in mind, and there were some powerful moments, notably at Canterbury Cathedral, where the Pope prayed with Anglicans at the site of the martyrdom of St. Thomas Becket.

And, yes, he did meet the queen — a courtesy visit, with tea at Buckingham Palace — with evident goodwill on both sides. Queen Elizabeth was wearing, I remember, a blue dress, and they were smiling and chatting as they emerged from the palace after tea. Postcards of the scene quickly became popular — I’ve still got mine.

The papal pilgrimage had the seven sacraments as its theme. At a packed Mass at Westminster Cathedral, the Pope baptized seven candidates of various ages, and then, after crossing the Thames at Lambeth Bridge, he arrived at St. George’s Cathedral, Southwark, which had been cleared of pews and filled with stretchers and wheelchairs bearing sick and disabled people from across Britain, and he administered the sacrament of the sick. And so it went on, across England and Wales and Scotland, with a penitential service, first Holy Communions, confirmations, ordinations and renewal of marriage vows. Vast crowds came, powerful moments of prayer experienced.

It was an unforgettable time. Looking back through the archives, something of the joy and excitement is still evident. So, too, are the changes since those days — the letters are typewritten (remember typewriters?) and there is just one reference to “a computer being installed” as a great innovation at one venue to store relevant information. Color photography relied entirely on film, paper and chemicals (some of the pictures have that curious greenish tinge that I remember well).  Fashions have, of course, changed: Ladies wore dresses, and there were even quite a lot of hats.

What did the papal visit achieve? A great deal. With its massive television coverage, it opened up an authentic vision of Catholic worship: from how Catholics pray to the centrality of the Eucharist. People saw what a baptism is and what is meant by the anointing of the sick. They saw the Pope as a bishop, a man in a white robe preaching about peace and the importance of family life and family prayer. Old notions of the Pope as a sinister foreign figure intent on imposing some sort of political rule were recognized as propaganda from a vanished era.

And that 1982 visit was followed, in the next century, by an official state visit by Pope Benedict XVI, where among much else, he addressed Parliament with a magnificent setting out of the respective roles of Church and state centered on a ringing call for true religious freedom. He led young people in a massive unforgettable night vigil of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in London’s Hyde Park, and he beatified John Henry Newman in a glorious Mass at Cofton Park on the outskirts of Birmingham.

The year 2022 sees another major milestone in Britain’s story: the platinum jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II. She has always been clear in her commitment to the Christian faith and spoken of it as central to her life and service.

So much has changed in the 70 years of her reign. While there has been progress in fields that include health and general prosperity, there is also much that is cause for great sadness: Britain is a country with too much violent crime, many unhappy young people, a drug crisis, a worrying suicide rate, and a collapse in a general understanding of many basic moral values, including the value of human life itself.

But the Christian message is still on offer and is the message that holds the hope of renewal; and in a country with a long history, and a tradition of marking anniversaries and jubilees, 2022 brings scope for missionary activity on a new scale. We must pray the opportunity is taken up. A reminder of that historic papal visit four decades ago is part of that.

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The Papal Visit

Pope Benedict XVI in the UK

John Paul II celebrates Mass at York Racecourse

I am happy to be with you in this historic city of York. We are in the shadow, as it were, of the beautiful Minster, and in the spiritual company of so many saintly men and women who have graced these northern counties.

My brothers and sisters,

On this feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary I greet you in the Lord. I am happy to be with you in this historic city of York. We are in the shadow, as it were, of the beautiful Minster, and in the spiritual company of so many saintly men and women who have graced these northern counties.

I deeply appreciate the presence here of many fellow Christians. I rejoice that we are united in a common Baptism and in our renewed search for full Christian unity.

I greet all those civic representatives from different cities and towns of Northern England. I thank you all for your welcome.

I am conscious of the history, especially the religious history, of this part of England. I refer to Holy Island where Aidan and Cuthbert brought the Catholic faith. I recall Bede, who wrote so lovingly of the early life of the Church in England. I remember that a thousand years later men and women laid down their lives in this region for the faith they loved. Mary Ward taught the Gospel of Jesus Christ to English exiles; Margaret Clitheroe gave her life in this city of York. These holy women inspire women today to take their rightful place in the life of the Church, as befits their equality of rights and particular dignity. In that same period the priest, Nicholas Postgate, carried the Gospel across the moors and gave his life on this very spot.

This morning, in Manchester, young men were ordained to the sacred priesthood of Christ. They were answering the call of God’s love. For many people, as for Margaret Clitheroe, that call from God comes in and through marriage and family life. This is our theme. In our liturgical setting, which calls to mind the supremacy of God’s saving grace, you married people will be invited to renew the promises you first made on your wedding day.

In a marriage a man and a woman pledge themselves to one another in an unbreakable alliance of total mutual self-giving. A total union of love. Love that is not a passing emotion or temporary infatuation, but a responsible and free decision to bind oneself completely, “in good times and in bad”, to one’s partner. It is the gift of oneself to the other. It is a love to be proclaimed before the eyes of the whole world. It is unconditional.

To be capable of such love calls for careful preparation from early childhood to wedding day. It requires the constant support of Church and society throughout its development.

The love of husband and wife in God’s plan leads beyond itself and new life is generated, a family is born. The family is a community of love and life, a home in which children are guided to maturity.

Marriage is a holy sacrament. Those baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus are married in his name also. Their love is a sharing in the love of God. Te is its source. The marriages of Christian couples, today renewed and blessed, are images on earth of the wonder of God, the loving, life-giving communion of Three Persons in one God, and of God’s covenant in Christ, with the Church.

Christian marriage is a sacrament of salvation. It is the pathway to holiness for all members of a family. With all my heart, therefore, I urge that your homes be centres of prayer; homes where families are at ease in the presence of God; homes to which others are invited to share hospitality, prayer and the praise of God: “With gratitude in your hearts sing psalm and hymns and inspired songs to God; and never say or do anything except in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Col. 3, 16. 17).

In your country, there are many marriages between Catholics and other baptized Christians. Sometimes these couples experience special difficulties. To these families I say: You live in your marriage the hopes and difficulties of the path to Christian unity. Express that hope in prayer together, in the unity of love. Together invite the Holy Spirit of love into your hearts and into your homes. He will help you to grow in trust and understanding.

Brothers and sisters, “May the peace of Christ reign in your hearts . . . let the message of Christ, in all its richness, find a home with you” (Col. 3, 15. 16).

Recently I wrote an Apostolic Exhortation to the whole Catholic Church regarding the role of the Christian Family in the modern world. In that Exhortation I underlined the positive aspects of family life today, which include: a more lively awareness of personal freedom and greater attention to the quality of interpersonal relationships in marriage, greater attention to promoting the dignity of women, to responsible procreation, to the education of children. But at the same time I could not fail to draw attention to the negative phenomena: a corruption of the idea and experience of freedom, with consequent self-centredness in human relations; serious misconceptions regarding the relationship between parents and children; the growing number of divorces; the scourge of abortion; the spread of a contraceptive and anti-life mentality. Besides these destructive forces, there are social and economic conditions which affect millions of human beings, undermining the strength and stability of marriage and family life. In addition there is the cultural onslaught against the family by those who attack married life as “irrelevant” and “outdated”. All of this is a serious challenge to society and to the Church. As I wrote then: “History is not simply a fixed progression towards what is better, but rather an event of freedom, and even a struggle between freedoms that are in mutual conflict” (IOANNIS PAULI PP. II Familiaris Consortio, 6).

Married couples, I speak to you of the hopes and ideals that sustain the Christian vision of marriage and family life. You will find the strength to be faithful to your marriage vows in your love for God and your love for each other and for your children. Let this love be the rock that stands firm in the face of every storm and temptation. What better blessing could the Pope with for your families than what Saint Paul wished for the Christians of Colossae: “Be clothed in sincere compassion, in kindness and humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with one another; forgive each other as soon as a quarrel begins. The Lord has forgiven you; now you must do the same. Over all these clothes . . . put on love” (Col. 3, 12-14).

Being a parent today brings worries and difficulties, as well as joys and satisfactions. Your children are your treasure. They love you very much, even if they sometimes find it hard to express that love. They look for independence and are reluctant to conform. Sometimes they wish to reject past traditions and even reject their faith.

In the family, bridges are meant to be built, not broken; and new expressions of wisdom and truth can be fashioned from the meeting of experience and enquiry. Yours is a true and proper ministry in the Church. Open the doors of your home and of your heart to all the generations of your family.

We cannot overlook the fact that some marriages fail. But still it is our duty to proclaim the true plan of God for all married love and to insist on fidelity to that plan, as we go towards the fullness of life in the Kingdom of heaven. Let us not forget that God’s love for his people, Christ’s love for the Church, is everlasting and can never be broken. And the convenant between a man and a woman joined in Christian marriage is as indissoluble and irrevocable as this love. This truth is a great consolation for the world, and because some marriages fail, there is an ever greater need for the Church and all her members to proclaim it faithfully.

Christ himself, the living source of grace and mercy, is close to all those whose marriage has known trial, pain, or anguish. Throughout the ages countless married people have drawn from the Paschal Mystery of Christ’s Cross and Resurrection the strength to bear Christian witness – at times very difficult – to the indissolubility of Christian marriage. And all the efforts of the Christian people to bear faithful witness to God’s law, despite human weakness, have not been in vain. These efforts are the human response made, through grace, to a God who has first loved us and who has given himself for us.

As I explained in my Apostolic Exhortation “Familiaris Consortio”, the Church is vitally concerned for the pastoral care of the family in all difficult cases. We must reach out with love – the love of Christ – to those who know the pain of failure in marriage; to those who know the loneliness of bringing up a family on their own; to those whose family life is dominated by tragedy or by illness of mind or body. I praise all those who help people wounded by the breakdown of their marriage, by showing them Christ’s compassion and counselling them according to Christ’s truth.

To the public authorities, and to all men and women of good will, I say: treasure your families. Protect their rights. Support the family by your laws and administration. Allow the voice of the family to be heard in the making of your policies. The future of your society, the future of humanity, passes by way of the family.

My brothers and sisters in Christ, who are now about to renew the promises of your wedding day: may your words express once more the truth that is in your heart and may they generate faithful love within your families. Make sure that your families are real communities of love. Allow that love to reach out to other people, near and far. Reach out especially to the lonely and burdened people of your neighbourhood, to the poor and to all those on the margin of society. In this way you will build up your society in peace, for peace requires trust, and trust is the child of love, and love comes to birth in the cradle of the family.

Today and always, may God bless all of you, and all the families of Britain. Amen.

And how can we not recall those many families in Britain and in Argentina who bear the heavy weight of pain and sorrow because of the loss of their loved ones in the South Atlantic. As we ask God to comfort them in their reflection, let us pray for peace a just and lasting peace so that other families may be spared the sufferings of war, so that other husbands, wives and children may not have to surrender what is most sacred in the community of the family, love and life. Amen.

Pope John Paul II’s Homily at York Racecourse in 1982

Homily given a York Racecourse by Pope John Paul II in 1982

Papal Liturgy at York Racecourse in 1982

Liturgy from the Mass at York Racecourse in 1982 with Pope John Paul II

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A very different papal visit from that of John Paul II in 1982

London letter: the catholic church says that security rules will make it difficult for the faithful to attend, writes mark hennessy….

LONDON LETTER: The Catholic Church says that security rules will make it difficult for the faithful to attend, writes MARK HENNESSY

JUST HOURS away from the beginning of Pope Benedict’s visit to England and Scotland, the Catholic Church is nervous.

His enemies believe his visit should be the stage for mass protests against the Vatican; his supporters hope for a show of support. Mostly, however, the British public is meeting the occasion of Pope Benedict’s visit with indifference.

Despite months of planning for the worst, British police forces now seem confident that the visit will not be targeted by unruly demonstrators, though security will not be relaxed until after his aircraft has taken off for home.

The invitation to make a state visit to the UK was made to Pope Benedict last year by the former prime minister, Presbyterian Gordon Brown, when he was received at the Vatican; though it was always believed that Mr Brown’s predecessor, Tony Blair, who converted to Catholicism after he quit Downing Street, had wanted to host a Papal visit during his time in office.

Much has changed since Pope John Paul II came to the UK on a pastoral visit in 1982 during the Falklands War. He spent six days being greeted like a rock-star as he travelled throughout Britain. In Liverpool, one million lined the seven-mile route from the city’s airport to its Anglican and Catholic cathedrals. Three hundred and fifty thousand came out in Coventry; 200,000 in Manchester; and 190,000 in York.

The 1982 visit faced its own crises. Indeed, it only went ahead after a desperate effort by the Archbishop of Liverpool to persuade the Pope not to cancel everything four days out because of his anger at the British invasion of the Falklands and his refusal to meet with then-British prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, as protocol would have allowed. In the end, the two did not meet.

However, 1982 is not just a foreign land for the Catholic Church, but also for the Church of England and many other Christian religions. The UK has in the three decades since become an increasingly secular society, less inclined to listen to religious figures, and where those who still see themselves as believers increasingly adopt an a la carte attitude to their faith.

An opinion poll published by the Catholic magazine, The Tablet, earlier this month found that just a quarter of those polled from the general population, not just Catholics, actively supported the idea of a state visit for Pope Benedict, while only 24 per cent believed the Catholic Church is a force for good. Only 36 per cent of those polled strongly agreed that religions of any kind are a force for good.

Pope Benedict is not Pope John Paul, who arrived in England as the survivor of an assassination attempt. Neither does he enjoy the communication skills possessed by the Polish pope. He has been damaged in the public eye by his handling of child-abuse cases involving priests – the ultimate responsibility for which lies at the door of his better-loved predecessor.

Nevertheless, Benedict has been pope for five years, and, yet, The Tablet’s opinion poll showed that more people recognised Prince Charles, X Factor entertainment guru Simon Cowell and England soccer manager Fabio Capello than the pope; though he did better than the Church of England Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, who was identified by just 50 per cent of those polled.

In a letter to the Guardian yesterday, opponents of the visit, including actor Stephen Fry, academic Richard Dawkins and writer Terry Prachett, insisted the pope should not be given the honour of a state visit.

They argued that the Vatican is responsible for opposing the distribution of condoms, so increasing large families in poor countries and the spread of Aids, and promoting segregated education. It had sought to deny abortion to “even the most vulnerable women”; opposes equal rights for gay people; and failed to address “the many cases of abuse of children within its own organisation”. “In any case, we reject the masquerading of the Holy See as a state and the pope as a head of state as merely a convenient fiction to amplify the international influence of the Vatican,” said the group.

Questioned about the last-minute preparations on Tuesday, leading British Catholic Chris Patten, who is Prime Minister David Cameron’s liaison for the visit with the church, denied responsibility for the crowds that will greet the pope. Such are matters for the Catholic Church, he was quick to point out.

The crowds will be a fraction of those of 1982. The church has grumbled that security rules have made it tougher than it should be for the faithful to attend.

Patten’s quick footwork in front of the cameras tell much about this visit: in 1982, many wanted to claim credit later; in 2010, it is about wanting to avoid blame.

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Memories of the Pope's visit to York on May 31, 1982

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Fifty years of papal visits to the United States

How the Guardian reported papal tours of America over the past half-century

• Pope Francis journeys to Washington to begin historic US visit
• Have you met the pope? Share your experiences

Fifty years after the first papal visit to the US, Pope Francis makes a three-city tour of the country which includes attending the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia.

The first reigning pontiff to visit the United States was Pope Paul VI, who made a one-day stop in New York to address to the United Nations in 1965. Here he called on the UN to declare ‘ no more war .’

The Guardian’s response to the speech was to be found in the editorial, Peace-loving is not enough . Elsewhere in the paper, Hella Pick noted that the Pope’s long handshake and seemingly friendly conversation with the Soviet foreign minister was subject to wide comment. Meanwhile, when the pope celebrated mass at the Yankee Stadium, Alistair Cooke reported that the ‘great, garish pit [was ] translated overnight into a circular cathedral.’

Fourteen years later, Pope John Paul II made the first of seven visits to the US.

After a 2,300 mile tour of America that included a visit to Harlem and a speech endorsing the conservative line on sex issues , Pope John Paul II became the first pontiff to visit the White House.

Other visits included a stopover in Fairbanks, Alaska in May 1984 , where he met President Ronald Reagan.

In 2008, Pope Benedict XVI visited Washington and New York. Making his first visit to the US since his election in 2005, he was greeted on the White House lawn by the president, George Bush, plus a 21-gun salute and a serenade from a world-class opera singer.

The 265th pope gave a resounding endorsement of the role of religion in democratic society telling a crowd of thousands that ‘the need for global solidarity is as urgent as ever’ in an age of extremism and terror. The following day he addressed the UN general assembly .

Visiting the US at the same time was Gordon Brown, the British prime minister, but, as Stephen Bates noted, he was never going to dominate the news agenda as ‘ passing popes will always outrank prime ministers .’

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History | Today in History: Pope John Paul II dies at 84

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Today is Tuesday, April 2, the 93rd day of 2024. There are 273 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On April 2, 2005, John Paul II, the Polish pope born Karol Józef Wojtyła, who became one of the most influential leaders of the 20th and early 21st centuries while working to build a moral foundation in the modern world and playing a crucial role in overthrowing communism, died in his Vatican apartment at age 84.

On this date:

In 1792, Congress passed the Coinage Act, which authorized establishment of the U.S. Mint.

In 1865, Confederate President Jefferson Davis and most of his Cabinet fled the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia, because of advancing Union forces.

In 1912, the just-completed RMS Titanic left Belfast to begin its sea trials eight days before the start of its ill-fated maiden voyage.

In 1917, President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to declare war against Germany, saying, “The world must be made safe for democracy.” (Congress declared war four days later.)

In 1982, several thousand troops from Argentina seized the disputed Falkland Islands, located in the south Atlantic, from Britain. (Britain seized the islands back the following June.)

In 1986, four American passengers, including an 8-month-old girl, her mother and her grandmother, were killed when a terrorist bomb exploded aboard a TWA jetliner en route from Rome to Athens, Greece; the remaining 110 passengers survived.

In 1992, mob boss John Gotti was convicted in New York of murder and racketeering; he was later sentenced to life, and died in prison.

In 1995, after a work stoppage lasting nearly eight months, baseball owners accepted the players’ union offer to play without a contract.

In 2002, Israel seized control of Bethlehem; Palestinian gunmen forced their way into the Church of the Nativity, the traditional birthplace of Jesus, where they began a 39-day standoff.

In 2003, during the Iraq War, American forces fought their way to within sight of the Baghdad skyline.

In 2007, in its first case on climate change, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency, ruled 5-4 that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases were air pollutants under the Clean Air Act.

In 2012, a gunman killed seven people at Oikos University, a Christian school in Oakland, California. (The shooter, One Goh, died in 2019 while serving a life prison sentence.)

In 2013, North Korea said it would restart its long-shuttered plutonium reactor and increase production of nuclear weapons material in what outsiders saw as its latest attempt to extract U.S. concessions by raising fears of war.

In 2017, Coach Dawn Staley and South Carolina won their first women’s NCAA championship with a 67-55 victory over Mississippi State.

In 2018, anti-apartheid activist Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, who’d been married for nearly 38 years to Nelson Mandela, died in a Johannesburg hospital at age 81.

In 2020, the number of confirmed coronavirus cases worldwide passed the 1 million mark, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

In 2021, rapper DMX was rushed from his home to a suburban New York hospital after going into cardiac arrest; he died a week later.

Today’s Birthdays: Actor Dame Penelope Keith is 84. Actor Linda Hunt is 79. Singer Emmylou Harris is 77. Actor Sam Anderson is 77. Social critic and author Camille Paglia is 77. Actor Pamela Reed is 75. Rock musician Dave Robinson (The Cars) is 75. Country singer Buddy Jewell is 63. Actor Christopher Meloni is 63. Singer Keren Woodward (Bananarama) is 63. Country singer Billy Dean is 62. Actor Clark Gregg is 62. Actor Jana Marie Hupp is 60. Rock musician Greg Camp is 57. Actor Roselyn Sanchez is 51. Country singer Jill King is 49. Actor Pedro Pascal is 49. Actor Adam Rodriguez is 49. Actor Michael Fassbender is 47. Actor Jaime Ray Newman is 46. Rock musician Jesse Carmichael (Maroon 5) is 45. Actor Bethany Joy Lenz is 43. Singer Lee Dewyze (TV: “American Idol”) is 38. Country singer Chris Janson is 38. Actor Drew Van Acker is 38. Actor Briga Heelan (TV: “Great News”) is 37. Actor Jesse Plemons is 36. Singer Aaron Kelly (TV: “American Idol”) is 31.

More in History

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History | Today in History: Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski arrested

History | Today in History: First Major League Baseball players’ strike begins

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Critic’s Notebook

When Larry Met Jean-Michel

A new exhibition tells the dealer’s story of how two rising stars, Larry Gagosian and Jean-Michel Basquiat, worked together in Los Angeles in the ’80s.

By Jonathan Griffin

Reporting from Los Angeles

In October 1981, when the art dealer Larry Gagosian first laid eyes on a painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat, he had never heard of the artist. “My hair stood on end,” he said of seeing the 20-year-old’s work. Just six months later, when Basquiat opened a solo show at Gagosian’s gallery in West Hollywood, the place, Gagosian recalled in an interview, “was absolutely mobbed.”

Few stars have risen so fast, and burned out so quickly. (Basquiat died in 1988 of a drug overdose at age 27.) His story is an archetypal tragedy, in which personal exceptionalism meets catastrophically with systemic prejudice — in his case, not only toward his race, but against his youthful, pan-cultural fame, his blatant ambition, his physical beauty and charisma, and his louche comportment. Even at the height of his success, New York — where he reportedly had trouble hailing a cab — was never an easy place for him.

Los Angeles, however, Basquiat liked so much that after his first visit in 1982, he soon returned, twice staying for months at a time and setting up studios at first in and then near Gagosian’s home on Market Street, a block from Venice Beach. For a spell, he was joined by his girlfriend Madonna, not yet a star, before she packed up and went home to New York. His output during his time in California was enormous, numbering around a hundred works, most now acknowledged to be museum-grade masterpieces.

Few institutions could pull off such an exhibition of the cream of Basquiat’s output while in Los Angeles, “Jean-Michel Basquiat: Made on Market Street,” at his Beverly Hills gallery. At its preview, lines ran down the block.

Larry Gagosian does not typically curate exhibitions. But this project is personal to him: It frames the story of his gallery, which began in the 1970s as a poster shop in Westwood, Los Angeles, and grew almost as quickly as Basquiat’s fame. By 1982, Gagosian was dealing works by Sol LeWitt and Ellsworth Kelly, but his first Basquiat show “really put the gallery on the map.”

As co-curator, he has enlisted Fred Hoffman, an art scholar and dealer who, in the 1980s, ran a printmaking studio in Los Angeles called New City Editions. On Basquiat’s second visit to Los Angeles, Gagosian suggested that they collaborate on a silk-screen edition. Hoffman ended up making many screens from Basquiat’s drawings, some of which the artist printed directly onto his canvases. Hoffman later wrote four books on Basquiat and even named his son Jean-Michel.

Unusually for an exhibition in a commercial space, “Made on Market Street” incorporates vitrines of related ephemera including hotel bills, receipts for first-class plane tickets, art supplies and clothing boutiques. It’s diverting stuff, nosing through Basquiat’s receipts for pants (Katharine Hamnett, 30-inch waist, $90) and jackets (Cerutti, 48R, $575). Rarely is an art-historical narrative laced so unapologetically with anecdote.

There’s plenty to feel uneasy about in this exhibition. For one thing, the story of a Black man (who is dead, and cannot speak for himself) today being used to bolster the story of a living white man — two, if you include Hoffman — is icky, at best.

In Phoebe Hoban’s biography, “Basquiat: A Quick Killing in Art,” first published in 1998, she paints a picture of consensual, mutual exploitation between the artist and his dealer.

John Seed, who worked at Gagosian’s gallery in the 1980s, told Hoban that he felt Basquiat was “a world-class manipulator who could keep up with Larry. He could both punish Larry and play the lost boy.” He sums up the pair’s relationship as: “Sharks and piranhas.”

She quotes Hoffman: Basquiat “didn’t trust Larry. He admired him as an art dealer. We would all hang out together and have a great time, but Larry would always say, ‘How about another painting?’”

Gagosian rejects the notion that Basquiat was exploited, by him or by anyone else. “Jean-Michel knew exactly what he was doing,” he said.

Then there are the prices. In an introduction to the 2016 edition of Hoban’s book, a Christie’s specialist gives his assessment of Basquiat’s market: “Some of my colleagues think that in our lifetime we will certainly see a painting sell for $100 million.” That statement aged fast; in 2017, the Japanese collector Yusaku Maezawa paid $110.5 million for Basquiat’s painting “Untitled” (1982) .

During his short career, Basquiat reaped plentiful rewards from his work. “I never had any problem selling a Basquiat painting, I can tell you that,” Gagosian says. But other people have made far more money off Basquiat than he ever made for himself.

As a result of such market extremes, any exhibition of Basquiat’s work, in a museum or in a commercial gallery, is a challenging feat. Despite Gagosian’s clout, some owners declined to lend their paintings for this show, and for those who did, insurance and courier transport costs were astronomical. (Thinking about the expense “kind of spoils the show” for him, Gagosian said with a chuckle.)

Ironically, because of this white-hot market, none of the pieces in “Made on Market Street” are (officially) available for sale. “There’s no price tags hanging on them,” said Gagosian, known for brokering sales of hitherto unavailable works, “but every now and then there could be a conversation.”

The effortlessly assured art in “Made in Market Street” makes the best case for Basquiat knowing exactly what he was doing. Throughout are written references to value, to market commodities and “legal tender.” A 1983 portrait of Hoffman, titled “Fred,” bears at its center the phrase “FINISHED PRODUCT,” in capital letters. Basquiat’s paintings incorporate a polymathic breadth of information, consisting of high and low, the academy and the street, the historical and the contemporary. In “Tuxedo,” an editioned silk-screen-on-canvas work that Hoffman made with Basquiat, dense notations include references to Leonardo da Vinci, Pope Alexander VI, the sack of Rome and Vasco da Gama alongside pork ribs, slot machines, cheese popcorn and “the mens [sic] shelter on third st.”

Above it all, Basquiat drew a large crown — a recurrent motif that became something of a logo. Basquiat may have chosen low-grade materials such as salvaged doors and grubby sheets of paper on which to paint, but he never doubted his own gifts.

The hushed center of this exhibition is formed by three paintings of what Hoffman, in the show’s catalog, calls “manifestations of a higher power.” These otherworldly beings, teeth bared and eyes glaring, which Hoffman compares to traditional depictions of sub-Saharan divinity figures, are regal and terrifying. No scrawled text is appended to these icons. Done on sections of a dilapidated wooden fence that once enclosed a yard behind Basquiat’s studio, in one instance painted a rich metallic gold, they fuse nobility with humility.

How did Los Angeles change Basquiat’s work? Neither Hoffman nor Gagosian can claim it did, definitively. One might point out, here and there among Basquiat’s graphomaniac inscriptions, a palm tree or some ocean waves. But Basquiat was so omnivorous that these additions hardly make a ripple. Perhaps one might sense in this work an easing of the angst and fury that courses through many of his paintings done in New York. His use of color opens up. The 1983 painting “ Hollywood Africans ,” now a jewel in the Whitney Museum’s collection, is uncharacteristically upbeat in its blue, red and yellow palette, even as its content alludes to the enduring racism of the entertainment industry.

Most of all, it seems that Basquiat just wanted to work. His time in Los Angeles, staying first as a guest in Gagosian’s house and later in the five-star L’Ermitage hotel in Beverly Hills, enabled him to do that. Although it may have been a respite from New York, Los Angeles nevertheless provided the requisite friction for Basquiat to generate sparks.

Jean-Michel Basquiat: Made on Market Street

Through June 1. Gagosian Gallery, 456 North Camden Drive, Beverly Hills; 310-271-9400; gagosian.com .

Art and Museums in New York City

A guide to the shows, exhibitions and artists shaping the city’s cultural landscape..

At Tiffany’s flagship, luxe art helps sell the jewels . This 10-story palace is filled with famous names, for a heady fusion of relevant, and discomfiting, contemporary art and retailing.

A new exhibition tells the dealer’s story of how two rising stars, Larry Gagosian and Jean-Michel Basquiat, worked together in Los Angeles  in the ’80s.

A bounteous and playful survey of Joan Jonas ’s, career on the vanguard highway fills the museum and the Drawing Center with the 87-year-old artist’s work..

Francesca Woodman’s crowning achievement, “Blueprint for a Temple (II),” is accorded pride of place in a show  that includes more than 50 lifetime prints.

Kiyan Williams, for their Whitney Biennial commission, recreated the column-lined facade of the White House from soil. Viewers can watch as it crumbles , sprouts plants and births insects.

Looking for more art in the city? Here are the gallery shows not to miss in March .