Keith Haring artwork Keith Haring Growing (Plate 1)

Keith Haring Growing (Plate 1), 1988 is the first installment of the artist’s Growing portfolio of 1988. In this work, Haring illustrates a flat yellow background and a blue ground embellished with short black lines. Atop the center of this backdrop, the artist renders a large red figure outlined in black. This figure appears to be comprised of three individuals disassembled and rearranged to create one towering form with six arms, six legs, and one head. This figure stretches nearly the entire length of the composition and mimics the visual language of hieroglyphics. This language is similar to the language of advertising, and in making this work Haring uses his screenprinted figures to communicate his ideals in a manner that appeals to mass media.

Keith Haring’s Growing (Plate 1), 1988 is part of a portfolio of five screenprints in the artist’s Lucky Strike portfolio of 1987. This body of work depicts fragments of figures rendered in the artist’s signature style dismantled and reconstructed to create enormous singular forms that dominate their compositions. Also featured in this portfolio are Growing (Plate 2), Growing (Plate 3), Growing (Plate 4), and Growing (Plate 5).

Created in 1987, this silkscreen is hand-signed by Keith Haring (Reading, 1958 – New York, 1990) in pencil in the center right image and numbered from the edition of 80 in pencil in the center right image.