Keith Haring 19581990

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Keith Haring1958-1990

• Keith Haring was driven by a fervent desire to
  communicate. His work -- built from an iconic
  language of signature lines and symbols --
  continues to reach out to the broadest of
  audiences, dissolving the boundary between fine
  art and popular culture, between the gallery and
  the street.

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The perfect public venue for his work the blank
advertising panels in New York City's subway
stations.
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"One day, riding in the subway, I saw this empty
black panel where an advertisement was supposed
to go. I immediately realized that this was the
perfect place to draw. I went back above ground
to a card shop and bought a box of white
chalk, went down and did a drawing on it.... I
kept seeing more and more of these black spaces,
and I drew on them whenever I saw one. Because
they were so fragile, people left them alone and
respected them they didn't rub them out or try
to mess them up. It gave them this other power.
It was this chalk-white fragile thing in the
middle of all this power and tension and violence
that the subway was. People were completely
enthralled." -- Keith Haring, in Rolling Stone,
August 10, 1989
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What kind of lines do you see?
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What are the visual clues in this image? What are
the symbols Haring used?
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Public Mural
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Haring also literally integrated the public into
his work for instance, he collaborated on a
number of community projects with inner-city
youth.
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Public Sculpture
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Haring made his art available over-the-counter
when he opened the Pop Shops in Manhattan and
Tokyo.
Both shops extended his message to the public
Haring T-shirts, buttons, patches, magnets, and
toys were sold at low prices to the community
at large.
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"I could have made more money if I just painted
fewer things and jacked up the price. But my
shop is an extension of what I was doing in the
subway stations, breaking down the barriers
between high and low art."-- Keith Haring, in
People magazine, November 1986 "My work was
starting to become more expensive and more
popular with the art market. Those prices meant
that only people who could afford big art prices
could have access to the work. The Pop Shop
makes it accessible. To me, the Pop Shop is
totally in keeping ideologically with what Andy
Warhol was doing and what conceptual artists
and earth artists were doing It was all about
participation on a big level."-- Keith Haring,
in Rolling Stone, August 10, 1989
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Inside the Pop Shop
Keith Haring inside his Pop Shop.