Last update:
April 10th
2001

the living room heart

corner Keith Haring -- 1987 - 1990 corner
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In 1987 Keith helds solo shows in Helsinki, in Antwerp and Knokke, Belgium. He showed painted steel masks and paintings on canvas at Tony Shafrazi Gallery. Participated in Art Against Aids, a benefit exhibition curated by Steven Reichard.

Painted murals at Team BBDO European Headquarters, Düsseldorf, Germany; at the Necker Children's Hospital, Paris; at the Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst, Antwerp; and at Casino Knokke, Belgium. Designed street signs for Toyko and collaborated on two murals with 500 children, Tama City, Japan.

Keith also painted murals at Carmine Street public swimming pool, New York City; collaborated on mural with Philadelphia CityKids; painted mural at Boys Club of New York, 135 Pitt Street, New York;. Keith was artist-in-residence and made mural installation for Cranbrook Academy of Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan.

Indeed, much of Haring's public work was devoted to making an impact on the lives of children, as exemplified by his large-scale sculpture of this year on the lawn of Schneider Children's Hospital in New Hyde Park, New York, or the carousel he designed in Hamburg, Germany, always in 1987.

schneidercarouselpark avenue

In 1988 Keith painted murals with children in Chicago and Atlanta and conducted workshops. He painted Easter at the White House a mural erected on the White House lawn, then donated to the Children's Hospital, National Medical Centerl, Washington, D.C. He then painted murals at FDR Drive and Houston Street in Manhattan, and a mural for the Grady Hospital pediatrics emergency room, Atlanta. Keith showed at the Hans Mayer Gallery, Düsseldorf, and Tony Shafrazi Gallery.

During the time that Keith had been rising in the art world, he had lost a number of close friends to the fatal disease of AIDS. Toward the end of 1988, he noticed a purple spot on his leg, a sign of an AIDS-related cancer called Kaposi's sarcoma. His doctors confirmed that he, too, had AIDS. The diagnosis did not come as a surprise to Keith.

"At first you're completely wrecked. You go through a major, major upset. So the first thing you do is, you kind of break down. I went over to the East River on the Lower East Side and just cried and cried and cried. But then you have to get yourself together and you have to go on. You realize it's not the end right then and there - that you have to continue and you've got to figure out how you're going to deal with it and confront it and face it.

"You can't despair, because if you do, you just give up and you stop. To live with a fatal disease gives you a whole new perspective on life. Not that I needed any threat of death to appreciate life, because I've always appreciated life. I've always believed that you live life as fully and as completely as you can. Actually, I've always felt that if you have a long life, it's a gift - and you're lucky if that happens to you. But there's no reason to count on it."

He publicly acknowledged his illness in a remarkably candid interview in Rolling Stone magazine. At first, it did not affect his work habits or his hectic travel schedule. But as the disease progressed, he became weaker and weaker until he was barely able to hold a pen. Keith's response to his illness was characteristically philosophical.

"No matter how long you work, it's always going to end sometime. And there's always going to be things left undone. And it wouldn't matter if you lived until you were seventy-five. There would still be new ideas. There would still be things that you wished you would have accomplished. You could work for several lifetimes... Part of the reason that I'm not having trouble facing the reality of death is that it's not a limitation, in a way. It could have happened any time, and it is going to happen sometime. If you live your life according to that, death is irrelevant. Everything I'm doing right now is exactly what I want to do.

"All of the things that you make are a kind of quest for immortality. Because you're making these things that you know have a different kind of life. They don't depend on breathing, so they'll last longer than any of us will. Which is sort of an interesting idea, that it's sort of extending your life to some degree."

Later, in 1988, he opened a Pop Shop also in Tokyo. Both shops further extended Haring's goal to deliver his message to the public: Haring T-shirts, buttons, patches, magnets, and toys were sold at low prices to the community at large.

tokyo pop shop

Although criticized by some voices within the art world as blatant commercialism, the Pop Shops were actually in keeping with Haring's philosophy. They invited the public to share in and enjoy his work, outside of the confines of a gallery setting.

"Doing the Pop Shops was letting the work become what it was becoming anyway, giving my endorsement to what would have happened by itself within this culture.... My acceptance first came from the public and then the art world had to deal with that; they had to figure out if they would endorse it -- or if because it was popular that meant that there was something wrong with it.

"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."

In 1989 Keith engaged in widespread campaign for Aids awareness. Painted murals in Monaco, Chicago, New York, Iowa City. He established the Keith Haring Foundation, a charitable organization seeking to constribute to a wide range of social concerns. He showed at Gallery 121, Antwerp.

Keith painted Together We Can Stop AIDS mural in Barrio de Chino, Barcelona. Designed a mural to be executed by the students at Wells Community Academy, Chicago. He was artist-in-residence for Chicago public schools and Museum of Contemporary Art mural project: he painted a mural with 300 high school students in Chicago.

gay & lesbian

Keith then painted the mural at The Center, a lesbian and gay community services center in New York City.

1989 us also the year of Progetto Italia: a commission by the city of Pisa asked him to paint a permanent mural on exterior wall of Church of Sant Antonio Monastery; and he painted a massive banner to wrap the side of a blimp in honor of the bicentennial of the French Revolution.

shafrazi

But then 1990 came... on February 16, Keith Haring died of AIDS related complications. He was only 31 year old.

At a memorial service, his sister Kay gave a moving tribute to her brother. "I remember that Keith was always drawing," she said. "It was his hobby, his pastime, his vehicle of expression, his very being. So, you see, it has always seemed to me that the brother I grew up with is the same brother that all of you know. Only the neighborhood get-togethers became the Manhattan club scene; the art projects with kids grew to include thousands and thousands of youths; his generous nature reached to touch virtually millions; and the canvas on which he drew became the whole world."

Today, a vast national and international public remembers Keith Haring for his strong, provocative, often smile-inducing works. But it is the children of every nationality and all walks of life that will remember Keith as their very special friend.

One of these, a 11-year-old boy named Sean Kalish, remembers Keith this way: "I was a friend of Keith's. I used to go to the Pop Shop all the time with my mom. One time, when I was five years old, this very nice man in the shop asked if my mom and I would like to meet Keith. He took us to Keith's studio.

"Keith was very nice. I thought he drew his art especially for kids. I liked the baby the best. The dog was my dad's favorite. In the studio, Keith said, 'Let's draw!' and that was neat. Later, Keith and I worked together on some etchings. There were these big metal plates. I would be working on one, and he would be working on one. Then we would switch and keep on drawing. I like drawing, because it's something you can do with someone else. I liked to draw with Keith, because he drew just like a kid. Now there won't be any more Keith Haring drawings. I wanted him to keep drawing for his whole life!"

Keith Haring always thought of himself as a funny-looking kid, which might be why kids all over the world responded to him. Keith said,

"I found out that I can make any kid smile. It's probably from having a funny face to begin with - and looking and acting like a kid. And kids can relate to my drawings, because of the simple lines."

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All Haring images © Estate Of Keith Haring

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