Keith Haring

Keith Haring was a queer contemporary artist whose work is remembered today for its unique style and how it was used to discuss social and political topics in the 1980s. Keith first began painting murals in New York, utilizing a unique and almost graffiti-esque style. He worked with chalk in the beginning of his career, splaying it on walls for the public to enjoy, promoting discussion around the topics he confronted in his art. Universally understandable and relatable, his work quickly rose to fame, where he utilized the attention to spread awareness of the crack epidemic in New York, the AIDS epidemic, and the apartheid of South Africa. After being diagnosed as HIV positive  in 1988, he used this to further embolden his activism, founding The Keith Haring Foundation that worked to spread awareness for AIDS at a time when the state was doing little. Perhaps his most recognizable painting was his last, “Unfinished Painting”, that he intentionally never finished. Initially, he sought to complete 100 canvases as his “final piece”. In this final series, he sought to explore the concepts of queerness, sickness, addiction, social stigma, and other intersecting ideas he thought pertinent. He died shortly after completing three of these in 1990 at the age of 31. “Unfinished Painting”, pictured here, is a heart wrenching piece that mimics the countless lives of, primarily but not exclusively queer, people that had been cut short by the crisis, as Haring himself would unfortunately be. It stands as a reminder to this day of the tragic fates people with AIDS suffered from not that long ago, and begs us to remember the beautiful and unique aspects of each person, despite how short their lives were.