Keith Haring's Once Upon A Time

Some readers may remember a UK poster shop called Athena. To anyone around in the 80s & early 90s it was enormously formative on our visual taste, including many of its works being considered quite controversial at the time. This was merely the preamble to my comment here, that heterocentric norms predominated then, as now. Keith Haring was one of the artists I remember as emblematic of 1980s art, but it is only now I have discovered his gorgeous mural in the gents' at the New York LGBT Centre. I certainly didn't realize he died of AIDS complications, I didn't even realize he was gay! This is art, kids, but not as the establishment would have it. It both comes from another place & takes us there.
'Haring's diagnosis was never a secret; it was public knowledge and an accepted part of his persona in the media. Those publicly shared thoughts were reflected, often with more depth, in his work. Despite all the fear that led up to diagnosis, in some ways Haring found his impending death liberating. It pushed him to produce more work as quickly as possible. In a 1989 interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Haring stated, "That's the point that I am at now, not knowing where it stops but knowing how important it is to do it now. The whole thing is getting more articulate. In a way it's really liberating."^[16] Critics have recognized this about Haring's works – particularly his later works – as well. "Haring's way of living life – liberated and with death in mind at a young age – allowed him to pull himself away from his diagnosis," Blinderman writes. "A year after his original diagnosis he was producing radiant paintings of birth and life." The introduction to the compilation of Haring's journals sings the same song: "Haring accepts his death. For in his art he found the key to transform desire, the force that killed him, into a flowering elegance that will live beyond his time."' Source