KEITH HARING

Keith Haring (1958-1990) was an American artist whose pop art and graffiti-like work grew out of the New York City street culture of the 1980s. Over the years, Haring’s work has grown in popularity. The spontaneous drawings in the NYC subway, chalk outlines of figures, dogs, and other stylized images on blank black advertising-space backgrounds have become the stuff of legend. He would often paint his figures on the lower part of the subway walls while seated on the floor.

Haring's work addressed AIDS awareness, apartheid, drug abuse, and LGBTQ rights, blending street culture with fine art. He created over 50 public murals worldwide, opened the Pop Shop to make his art accessible, and collaborated with artists like Andy Warhol and Grace Jones. Diagnosed with AIDS in 1988, Haring used his final years to promote activism until his death in 1990.

Choose Your Weapon

In Choose Your Weapon, Banksy portrays British disaffected youth and gang culture whose aggressive dogs have become weaponry in their quest for power. The minimalist animal, painted in a hieroglyphic all-white silhouette, pays tribute to Haring’s famous Barking Dog. Maybe Banksy invites us to “Choose Our Weapon” for peace and freedom. Like Banksy, Haring too rose to prominence through his street art, making him an important influence for Banksy. Indeed, one can also see this work as an illustration of the artist’s power in using his art and talent to convey messages.

The “Barking Dog” featuring colorful canines with their mouths open mid-yap—is one of Keith Haring‘s most universally recognizable symbols, and remains a testament to his dedication to accessible art.

The dog’s simple, cartoonish shape references Haring’s interest in Egyptian hieroglyphics -how humans from that time communicated their experiences through universal shapes and signs. Haring’s “Barking Dogs” can be found throughout his career, from some of his earliest Subway Drawings, to merchandise sold in his Pop Shops.

In 1990, just a few months before his early death, Haring chose to immortalize his “Barking Dog” motif alongside four more of his most celebrated symbols in a series of lithographs entitled “Icons” – which further cemented the graphic canine as one of the most important symbols in his body of work.

Banksquiat

Banksquiat presents a carousel installation in which the traditional fairground horse is replaced by a monumental crown, rendered in the unmistakable visual language of Jean-Michel Basquiat. The form is raw, skeletal, and immediate, echoing Basquiat’s characteristic line: urgent, fragmented, and expressive. Positioned at the center of the ride, the crown becomes both structure and subject, rotating mechanically within the circular system of the carousel.

Banksy makes further reference to street art history by choosing to print his design in grey with the crowns outlined in a chalky white against a black ground. This clearly refers to another icon of street, Keith Haring, who started his career with a series of subway drawings, rendered in chalk on empty advertising panels in the New York Metro system.

Their work was immediate, unauthorized, and inseparable from the urban environment. It resisted containment. Banksy positions himself within this lineage yet introduces a critical distance. Banksquiat is not only about that moment of freedom: it is about what follows. What happens when that energy is recognized, collected, exhibited, and ultimately systematized.