A Closer Look: Keith Haring
Untitled, 1983
A Closer Look: Keith Haring
Untitled, 1983
Haring, 1983
Untitled, 1983, is among Keith Haring's coveted early tarpaulin paintings, significant in Haring's oeuvre as the first mature paintings conceived as individual artworks intended for sale. Masterfully executed on an impressive scale, Untitled, clearly reveals Haring’s roots as a graffiti artist, equally comfortable painting entire sides of city buildings or the walls of New York City subway platforms. The fluidity and confidence of Haring’s line, painted without erasure or hesitation, shows the artist working at the absolute height of his powers.
Untitled, 1983
Untitled, 1983, features a single crouching female figure, evoking an ancient fertility goddess. Rendered with immediacy and graphic symmetry, Haring devised a towering red figure looming against an austere black ground, delineated with bold blue lines in his most quintessential manner. Here, Haring draws on an archetype rooted in diverse cultural traditions, spanning the globe across centuries. Dating back to the Paleolithic era and perhaps the earliest human form ever created, the figure of a pregnant goddess appears under various guises, bearing names such as Anahita, Ishtar, Artemis, Hathor, and Bastet among many others. In Haring’s iteration, the figure appears to be punctured through the center with a form resembling the astrological symbol of Venus, heightening its ancient and mythic association with feminine power.
Keith Haring, Untitled, 1983, The Broad, Los Angeles
Similar Keith Haring works can be found in various collections, including Untitled, 1983, The Broad, Los Angeles, and Untitled, 1981, in the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.
“The tarps were deceptively simple and graphic, and their imagery and palette predominated in Haring’s art over the next eight years in ambitious paintings, murals, and commercial products. As for color, the tarps reintroduced the commercial colors of sixties Pop and traffic signs. Typical were bold primaries (reds, yellows) but also black, purples, greens, oranges, and pinks. Haring painted thick, heavy lines with a velocity that flung a trail of drips over the surface.”
Elisabeth Sussman in Exh. Cat., New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Keith Haring, 1997, p. 18