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Keith Haring Title: Story of Red and Blue Medium: Lithograph Size: 56 x 42 cm Edition: 90 Year: 1989	Keith Haring Title: Story of Red and Blue Medium: Lithograph  Size: 56 x 42 cm Edition: 90 Year: 1989 SOLD	Keith Haring Title: Story of Red and Blue Medium: Lithograph Size: 56 x 42 cm Edition: 90 Year: 1989 SOLD	Keith Haring Title: Story of Red and Blue Medium: Lithograph Size: 56 x 42 cm Edition: 90 Year: 1989 SOLD
Keith Haring Title: Untitled Medium: Acrylic screenprint on canvas Size:20 x 20 cm Edition: 60 Year: 1989	Keith Haring Title: Fertility I Medium: Screenprint Size:106 x 127 cm Edition: 100 Year: 1983 SOLD	Keith Haring Title: Growing I Medium: Screenprint Size:76 x 101 cm Edition: 100 Year: 1988	Keith Haring Title: Growing II Medium: Screenprint Size:76 x 101 cm Edition: 100 Year: 1988 SOLD

 

 

Upon graduation from high school in 1976, Haring enrolled in the Ivy School of Professional Art in Pittsburgh, a commercial arts school. After two semesters Kieth Haring dropped out. While in Pittsburgh, Haring continued to study and work on his own and in 1978 had a solo exhibition of his work at the Pittsburgh Arts and Crafts Center.

Later that same year, Haring moved to New York City and enrolled in the School of Visual Arts (SVA). In New York, Haring found a thriving alternative art community that was developing outside the gallery and museum system, in the downtown streets, the subways and spaces in clubs and former dance halls. Here he became friends with fellow artists Kenny Scharf and Jean-Michel Basquiat, as well as musicians, performance artists and graffiti writers that comprised the burgeoning art community. Haring was also inspired by the work of Jean Dubuffet, Pierre Alechinsky, William Burroughs, Brion Gysin and Robert Henri’s manifesto The Art Spirit, which asserted the fundamental independence of the artist and by Andy Warhol’s unique fusion of art and life.

Between 1980 and 1989, Haring achieved international recognition and participated in numerous group and solo exhibitions. His first solo exhibition in New York was held at the Westbeth Painters Space in 1981. In 1982, he made his Soho gallery debut with an immensely popular and highly acclaimed one-man exhibition at the Tony Shafrazi Gallery.

In April 1986, Haring opened the Pop Shop, a retail store in Soho selling T-shirts, toys, posters, buttons and magnets bearing his images. Haring considered the shop to be an extension of his work and painted the entire interior of the store in an abstract black on white mural, creating a striking and unique retail environment. Haring remained committed to his desire to make his artwork available to as wide an audience as possible, and received strong support for his project from friends, fans and mentors including Andy Warhol. He also developed watch designs for Swatch and an advertising campaign for Absolut vodka; and creating murals worldwide.

Haring produced more than 50 public artworks between 1982 and 1989, in dozens of cities around the world, many of which were created for charities, hospitals, children’s day care centers and orphanages. The now famous Crack is Wack mural of 1986 has become a landmark along New York’s FDR Drive. Other projects include a mural created for the 100th anniversary of the Statue of Liberty in 1986, on which Haring worked with 900 children, a mural on the exterior of Necker Children’s Hospital in Paris, France in 1987 and a mural painted on the western side of the Berlin Wall three years before its fall.

Haring was diagnosed with AIDS in 1988 and in 1989, he established the Keith Haring Foundation, its mandate being to provide funding and imagery to AIDS organizations and children’s programs. During a brief but intense career that spanned the 1980's, 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.