After Keith Haring

A tri-fold booklet published to announce Haring's 1984 solo exhibition at Paul Maenz Gallery in Cologne.

• After Keith Haring.
• Cologne, Germany: Galerie Paul Maenz, 1984.
• Includes a German translation of Haring’s 1984 interview in Flash Art International.
• Offset lithograph.
• This work is presented unframed.

Keith Haring was born in 1958 in Reading, Pennsylvania. From a young age he enjoyed drawing, especially Disney characters & cartoons. He initially set out to become a commercial artist but after a year at the Ivy School of Professional Art in Pittsburgh, Haring dropped out, moved to New York City to enroll in the School of Visual Arts (SVA). Haring immediately felt connected to the thriving downtown arts scene happening and became friends with Jean-Michel Basquiat and Kenny Scharf.

Inspired by the ideals of “art as life” and moving the art experience out of galleries and into the streets, Haring’s first major works were his subway drawings. Haring produced over one hundred of these public works between 1980 and 1985, integrating his now-iconic exuberant, cartoonish outlined figures into everyday public space in a way that directly engaged its viewers. Haring recalled that the most important aspects of these works was the immediate engagement people had with them, asking him “what does it mean?” and giving him feedback that he’d then incorporate into future drawings.

These works quickly garnered the attention of tastemakers in New York and his first solo exhibition was held at Westbeth Painters Space in 1981 and a celebrated show debuted at the high-profile Tony Shafrazi Gallery in New York in 1982.

Throughout the 1980s, Haring was committed to democratizing the art experience and along with paintings, he also created theater sets, billboards, murals, advertising campaigns and even a line of Swatch watches. In 1986 he opened the Pop Shop in SoHo - a highly influential contemporary crossover to art & commerce that are now so dominant in the work & practice of Yayoi Kusama, KAWS and Takashi Murakami.

In addition to this ideology of accessibility, Haring was also very socially engaged and used his striking imagery to promote awareness of various political and social campaigns. His many notable public works included a mural on the western side of the Berlin Wall, the Crack is Wack mural in New York, and a mural for the 100th anniversary of the Statue of Liberty in 1986.

Haring was diagnosed with AIDS in 1988 and used his presence in the arts community to raise awareness of the crisis. In 1989, a year before his death, he established the Keith Haring Foundation, whose mission is to raise funds for AIDS organizations and children’s literacy and arts programs.

Since his death in 1990, Haring has become one of the most widely-recognized and celebrated artists of the 20th century.