Watch This Now: MTV Brings Back "Art Breaks" With Help From MoMA PS1 and Creative Time

MTV Art Breaks, old and new, with stills from videos by Jean Michel Basquiat and Rashaad Newsome.

Back in the 80's, when MTV was still airing these things called "music videos," the fledgling rebel cable network decided to take things one step further with "Art Breaks," a series of short video art pieces by the likes of Keith Haring, Richard Prince and Jean Michel Basquiat. The aim was to "bring visual art to viewers who tuned in to MTV for the art of music videos."

Now MTV has revived "Art Breaks," inviting NYC contemporary art authorities MoMA PS1 and Creative Time to curate new videos by artists such as Mickalene Thomas, Rashaad Newsome and Jani Ruscica. You can follow "Art Breaks" on Tumblr and watch both the new segments as well as some of the '80s classics.

"This collaboration allows a younger generation of artists to experiment beyond the walls of the museum and onto the screens of a broad, international audience," says MoMA PS1 Director Klaus Biesenbach, while MTV President Stephen Friedman adds that "creative expression and experimentation are at the core of MTV's DNA." (We will keep our mouths shut on that one, but we do condone this particular project.)

"Art Breaks" will likely get the most exposure online, but we most certainly love imagining "Jersey Shore" viewers being inadverntently turned on to contemporary art in between all of the drama, fights and binge drinking (followed by the binge drinking, drama and fights.)

Meanwhile, watch videos by Mickalene Thomas and Richard Prince below and head to Artbreaks.mtv.com for more.

-- John Ruscher