Keith Haring: Untitled (FDR NY) #5-22, 1984 / Art Basel 2024 Unlimited

Keith Haring: Untitled (FDR NY) #5-22, 1984. Martos Gallery, Gladstone Gallery at Art Basel 2024 Unlimited. Basel (Switzerland), June 13, 2024.
Keith Haring’s monumental frieze Untitled (FDR NY) was created in situ on a fence lining the Franklin D. Roosevelt East River Drive in New York City in 1984. Originally extending nearly 300 feet along the highway, the mural comprised roughly 30 panels animated with Haring’s exuberant iconography and was on view for almost a year before the individual panels were taken down in 1985 and subsequently dispersed. Since then, various groups of the rescued panels have been exhibited at venues including the Musée des Beaux-Arts and Anciens Abattoirs, Mons, Belgium, in 2009, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Lyon, France, in 2008. Comprising a significant section of the original mural, Untitled (FDR NY) #5-22 brings together 18 panels, exhibited as a group for the first time since their creation and initial display 40 years ago.

Keith Haring (born 1958 in Reading, Pennsylvania; died 1990 in New York) first rose to prominence in the early 1980s for his spontaneous, graffiti-inspired drawings in New York City subway stations. Throughout his short career and after his untimely death in 1990, Haring’s unique visual language and iconic motifs have remained relevant to global audiences.