-Assignment Intro-
This assignment instructs us to write an artist’s journal entry as if students were the artist assigned. I was assigned to be a famous street artist, Keith Haring.
-Journal Entry-
Hilarious Haring’s Half-life
My name is Keith Haring. I am a homosexual artist, personally, I would specify myself as a graffiti artist and an anarchist. I have AIDS. When you are reading this, I am probably half gone, but hopefully, with my foundation and my gallery, my concept and spirit would carry on, rippling subtly in the long art history.
Born and raised in Reading, Pennsylvania, I had always been in love with animation created by Disney, Dr. Seuss, and Looney Toons during my childhood. Pursuing my love for art, I enrolled Ivy School of Professional Art in Pittsburgh in 1976, where my firsts solo exhibition was presented, and then the School of Visual Arts in New York, where I found a sense of belonging. New York is half-city-half-amazing, I can never imagine places like CBHB, club 57, things like SAMO, hip-hop, and people like Kenny Scharf, Jean-Michel Basquiat. The burgeoning art community here had wakened me up when I first arrived at this city. On the surface, the city seemed catastrophic: gunfire in Harlem, robs in Brooklyn, drugs in East Village, however, deep in people’s inner selves, art was prosperously growing: liberty and democracy had been maximized, sexual orientation was not limited by traditional values, overloaded stress triggered people to go hysteria for relax—this very city provided an unprecedented art environment. Hence, I decided to leave my own mark in this terrific artists cradle.
My leaving-mark journey started in fall, 1980. I found the subway stations quite convenient for art creation since people were walking by and they stared at those messy walls waiting for trains. To cover out-of-time posters and boring advertisements, people would just paint the whole wall black for tidiness in subway stations, which is quite monotonous. Therefore, I figured I may beautify these walls using chalks. Unfortunately, drawing publicly was illegal thereby I was arrested and handcuffed several times doing chalk-drawing, but I would just give them 10 dollars as fine so that they kept my pieces under the subway stations. I figured people love my art by the platform since even the police were trying to catch me because they were eager to know who drew these. This is where my story in NYC begins, it starts from a humid, crowded place, where I would like to bring my art and love into.
Haring, Untitled, 1982, acrylic on vinyl
First time I have a chance to draw my iconic cartoon above the ground, I drew two men playing around with a heart as background and released it on Valentine Day, 1982. This is the first time I introduce my typical white contoured men into a colorful circumstance like a glowing heart. I would consider this piece as one of reflection of my personality: love is the ultimate goal that I do everything for and blank contoured character represents my stance that people are born with the same personal rights and there should not be any discrimination against sexual orientation, appearance, and skin color—that’s why I drew every single man the same. The uniqueness of my works in my early career brought me back with fame and critics. Along with the accumulation of fame, I wondered if I could go further, I wanted to be proud of my weirdness. Homosexual artists often construct their character with clandestine sexuality but I will not do it that way; even though homosexuality is recognized, people feel frightened to speak out their sexual orientation but I will not do it that way.
Haring, Untitled, 1984, acrylic on paper
In the middle of 80s, I started to pursue those outraged senses of humor due to countless injustice incidences I saw in this artistic but aloof society. I had gained a certain amount of attention but I never stopped thinking to go further. I want attention, I want justice, I want recognition. I went radical that period, I drew man’s penis in a detailed way compared to my blank contoured man, I made large-sized piece that could take a wall in my exhibition in Soho, I even drew a large African tied by a tiny little white man to support Nelson Mandela in South Africa so that me and my work can be noticed publicly. I want it to be a culture, which people can appreciate and analyze, the more radical and wild my work goes, the more people would investigate them. In the middle 80s, it worked. People started to enjoy my wild presentation of male nudity and homosexuality just like they fell in love with my work at the platforms; me and my friends, Andy Warhol, we made an art movement which we call pop art. I would call it my largest accomplishment in my life.
Throughout my short career that was within a decade, I started from beautifying couples of black walls using chalks to exhibiting large-sized radical piece in my own exhibition; I formed an earthquake in the art world which challenges those detached high arts, in which people only express their individual emotions. Incorporating my own political, sexual, and racial stances, my work is getting popular in recent years. Unfortunately, I have to leave for another world. Wish the burgeoning art community blossoms, and harvests finally years later. For my own disease, AIDS, please keep in mind, people, fewer drugs, less non-protection sex, I would donate all my saving in these 4 years selling products with my work on it to found a Keith Haring foundation to fight against what took my life.
Goodbye, world. Always for love.
Sincerely
Keith Haring
Citation
Haggerty Museum of Art, Marquette University. “Keith Haring Ch 12 Interview.” YouTube. October 26, 2017. Accessed January 28, 2019. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srrgmXofV6o&t=3s.
“Keith Haring Overview and Analysis.” The Art Story. Accessed January 28, 2019. https://www.theartstory.org/artist-haring-keith.htm.
Bio | Keith Haring. Accessed January 28, 2019. http://www.haring.com/!/about-haring/bio#.XE401VxKhEZ.
-Reflection-
This assignment authentically gives us a vivified experience of being the artists themselves and think, talk, write in their ways with their value of world, humanity, and aesthetics. It is a pretty creative way for us to fit in the role we are going to play for the next few weeks and I pretty enjoy investigating the artist, watching their interview, and reading their biographies.
