Why is Keith Haring everywhere right now?
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Comments (7)
Ludwig
08 Jan 2024Great article!
I suspect that David Stark and his Artestar agency are behind this. Stark used to work for Haring up until the artist’s death and managed his estate afterwards for many years. He founded Artestar in 2003 to do artist / brand collaborations, with Haring at the forefront.
In 2018 they entered China with a Haring / Coach matchup, found fertile ground in the Gen Z demographic and WHAAM! 🙂 Looking at the Artestar lineup, we can look forward to Basquiat, Mapplethorpe, etc, etc.
Why Haring? Besides the connection with Stark, I think his art lends itself well to commercialisation. It’s simple, colourful, instantly recognisable and not too edgy. I wonder who will go big next…
Dominique
08 Jan 2024That’s a really interesting take, thanks Ludwig!
I agree with you that Haring’s work was made to go commercial – I guess I was just hoping to stumble on some pivotal event (like an important retrospective) or significant anniversary that acted as the catalyst for his sudden reappearance. But I tend to think that you’re right here, and that it all comes down to business connections at the end of the day.
Basquiat could be an interesting “next big thing”. I shudder to think what a Mapplethorpe moment would look like! They’ll have to but a PG rating on the homeware section at H&M if that happens, haha!
Ludwig
08 Jan 2024I agree with you on Mapplethorpe 🙂 I even tried to imagine Blake, Goya and Bosch versions of brands, but for some reason the older artists don’t cut it. It looks like you need IP to make it work.
You could even argue that Haring himself is behind this, given his philosophy of democratising art, taking it out of the museums and galleries and spreading it far and wide. This ethos inspired Stark to go big.
The interesting thing is that all the commercial hype now feeds back to museums, with “blockbuster museum exhibitions launching for Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Kenny Scharf, Tom Wesselmann and Mickalene Thomas” over the next two years, according to Stark. So the retrospectives are following the trends instead of setting it at the moment.
On the timing: I guess the time is just ripe for such collaborations.
First we had music. Partnerships and quirky mashups have always been big in music, but these days “A feat. B” is over the top. I just scanned Apple Music’s Today’s Hits playlist and 31 of 104 songs credit multiple big-name artists. Then we had all the “A x B” fashion collabs. Now it’s art’s turn, it seems.
It’s a powerful mathematical principle: rather than sourcing 45 unique ideas, just take 10 and combine then in pairs. The power of multiplication 🙂 If you are still not happy, combine them in triplets. There are diminishing returns, though!
Tim Anderson
10 Jan 2024Thanks for another great article Dominique.
There are other examples of works of art being used for commercial purposes. Two of the most famous are Van Gogh’s Starry night and Munch’s The Scream, both painted about 130 years ago. Starry night has inspired designs on mugs, shoes, jewellery and pretty much everything else. And of course it inspired Don Maclean to write his hit song. The Scream is often used as masks for bank robbers in movies, for getting out political messages about the awfulness of your opponents and Macaulay Culkin popularised it in the Home Alone series.
The questions are, like your questions: why these images rather than others? What made them ideal for this purpose? What was the trigger? Who/what started the movement? Is it just a coincidence that both Van Gogh and Munch had mental health problems?
I don’t have the answers, sadly, but would be interested in your views.
Dominique
15 Jan 2024You’re not wrong Tim – there certainly has been a history of artworks being commercialised after their creators have passed on. I guess what stood out to me the most about the Haring and Kahlo phenomena is how in both cases it is one artist seemingly coming out of nowhere, dominating shopfronts for a few seasons and then quietly disappearing into obscurity again, whereas the Van Gogh and Munch artworks that you mentioned pop up more sporadically over a greater length of time.
There have been some really great theories about the why and how in this comment section already – make sure you read Ludwig’s first comment in the thread above for a really great clue about Haring’s work!
Colleen Wessels
14 Jan 2024I think that Haring’s style representing an awareness of sexuality and sometimes being at odds with the world as to a person’s sexual identity feels a gap in the art world of today. Gender definitions and acceptance throughout society including the church is the buzz topic of this century . There are sixteen terms/titles at present which define which side of the gender one tends to favour. Maybe just wearing or using an item with his distinct style minimises a definition !
Dominique
15 Jan 2024You might be on to something Colleen! Haring certainly does fit in with the current discussions around gender and sexuality.