Keith Haring

1958 - 1990

Biography

Born in 1958, Keith Haring developed a love for drawing at an early age, copying his father’s flair for cartooning to emulate images from Dr. Seuss and Walt Disney.
Aside from two semesters at the Ivy School of Professional Art in Pittsburgh, Haring was self taught until 1978 when he attended New York’s School of Visual Arts. Becoming an active participant in the city’s thriving alternative arts community, Haring turned away from traditional mediums for displaying art, instead using subways, streets, clubs and former dance halls as canvas.
He thrived on the energy and spirit of the alternative scene, befriending fellow artists Kenny Scharf and Jean-Michel Basquiat. And while his devotion to creating truly public art was drawn from the participatory nature of Christo’s work and by Warhol’s unique fusion of art and life, his graphic style was heavily influenced by Jean Dubuffet, Pierre Alechinsky, William Burroughs, Brion Gysin and Robert Henri’s manifesto ‘The Art Spirit’.
During a brief but intense career that spanned the 1980s, Haring’s work was featured in over 100 solo and group exhibitions. In 1986 alone, he was the subject of more than 40 newspaper and magazine articles. By expressing universal concepts of birth, death, love, sex and war, using a primacy of line and directness of message, Haring was able to attract a wide audience and assure the accessibility and staying power of his imagery, making it a universally recognised visual language of the 20th century.
Keith Haring died of AIDS related complications at the age of 31 on 16 February, 1990. Since his death, Haring has been the subject of several international retrospectives. The work of Keith Haring can be seen today in the exhibitions and collections of major museums around the world.

Images

Untitled (Andy Mouse) 1985 Oil, acrylic and silver paint on canvas 71.1 cm diameter