New Keith Haring Exhibition Makes Questionable Case for the Enduring Popularity of the Pop Shop Artist

“The only good thing about Keith Haring,” an observer I overheard say while visiting The Brant Foundation, “is that his art is recognizable.” The only good thing? Tell that to Eduardo Kobra, the Brazilian artist who saw fit to include Haring on a mural situated directly above the Empire Diner on Tenth Avenue and 22nd Street. On it, Mr. Kobra reimagines Mount Rushmore by supplanting George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln with Andy Warhol, Frida Kahlo, Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat. Underneath them are a trio of Haring’s glyphic figures and his signature barking dog. Immortalized beside the Prince of Pop Art, the Queen of Miseria, and his comrade in graffiti, SAMO©: Not bad for a vandal, don’t you think?I’m sorry, make that “urban guerilla.” That’s how the canny capitalist is described by an art historian, Dieter Buchhart, who co-organized the Brant exhibition, “Keith Haring,” with Anna Karina Hofbauer. The curators would likely bristle at the “capitalist” appellation or the suggestion that Haring profited from his distinctive iconography. Mr. Buchhart and Ms. Hofbauer have, in fact, argued that an endeavor like the famed Pop Shop was “a continuation of [Haring’s] public practice by other means.” This is artspeak meant to obscure a simple truth: Some guys like to make a buck. Who could blame Haring? Artists throughout history have sought the favor of patrons in order to eat and keep roofs over their heads, but here Haring is posited as “a positive humanist virus . . . fighting against ignorance, fear, and silence.” Mr. Buchhart goes on to kvell about the metaphysical nature of the artist’s vision, as well as his emoji-like prescience: “We are all speaking Haring now.”Forget for a moment how ill-suited it might be to describe a young man brought down by AIDS as a “virus”: Haring’s continuing popularity is worth mooting. Thirty-six years after his death at age 31, his energetic suffusions of dots, dashes and thingamajigs continue to garner admirers. Concision of means and legible messages offer an accessible alternative to an art world that is seen, and not without reason, as trading in obfuscatory theories, political grandstanding, and condescending attitudes. Keith Haring in 1985. Wikimedia CommonsGlowing babies, wiggly lines and a neurosis-free horror vacui are to-the-point markers, made all the more readable by a vocabulary cribbed from Paul Klee’s pictograms, Jean Dubuffet’s Art Brut, A.R. Penck’s Neo-Expressionism, and comic strips. The abundance of children I encountered while visiting the Brant Foundation testify to the worry-free nature of Haring’s art, though one imagines it must’ve proved challenging for parents to explain some of the imagery. A masturbating Mickey Mouse is something we don’t typically encounter or think about.Haring’s appeal also stems from the romanticization of graffiti — bringing it to the people by sticking it to the man — as well as nostalgia for an East Village bohemia that has since been altered by an omniverous real estate market. As it is, “Keith Haring” is a sizable exhibition dedicated to a small talent, a catch-as-catch-can compendium of unwavering surety, juvenile posturing, and haplessly choreographed color. The lone piece evincing any moxie is a throwaway portrait of Haring by his confrère, Basquiat. Whatever else you can say about him, Basquiat could put down a line that had a semblance of vitality. Rote efficiency, in marked comparison, was Haring’s forte, and it’s best suited for the likes of a refrigerator magnet or T-shirt. Here is a Day-Glo distraction in which productivity outshines profundity.

New Keith Haring Exhibition Makes Questionable Case for the Enduring Popularity of the Pop Shop Artist

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