On Rai 5 an evening on street art with documentaries on Keith Haring and urban art in Rome

On Friday, February 19, on Rai 5 at 9:15 p.m., an evening entirely dedicated to Keith Haring (Reading, 1958 - New York, 1990) and street art as part of the Art Night container: two documentaries, Keith Haring. Street art boy and Walls and Murals, to explore the world of the most popular, accessible art form aimed at the masses, which exploded decades before Banksy.

Before this cultural phenomenon gained a foothold in the landscape of contemporary creativity, there were few who measured themselves against painting on large building walls, few who were accorded a role in art history. Among those few (Basquiat and Blek le Rat, for example, among others), one can count Keith Haring. Ben Anthony’s BBC-produced documentary Keith Haring: street art boy reveals why, 30 years after his death from an AIDS-related illness at only 31, his work still dominates popular culture.

In June 1986 Andy Warhol took a now-famous photograph of a group of young people in New York City. These were not the usual everyday revelers, but some of the greatest innovators and creatives of the time, all miraculously captured in a single frame. The photo shows artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, wearing a suit and staring sassy into the lens; to his left is Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti, model and singer Grace Jones, cheekbones and hard gaze, deep in conversation with a man whose eyebrows are comically raised: U.S. artist Keith Haring. His cheerful cartoon images of crawling children, barking dogs and dancing men were everywhere on walls, billboards and in galleries. For some time, a Haring baby even lit up Times Square. The documentary shows never-before-seen footage from the Haring Foundation archives tracing the life and work of this exceptional artist. The words and stories of family members, artist and curator friends are interwoven with the voice of Haring himself taken from an unpublished interview.

The film is an immersion in the underground scene of 1980s New York, where Haring was a promoter of an art accessible to all, composed of a figurative vocabulary that became and still is a global icon, and that found in the public space its place of exhibition. The documentary shows us his relationship with the likes of Andy Warhol and Madonna, the creation of his pop shop, the design of a huge banner made in 1986 together with teenagers from New York’s underprivileged neighborhoods, but also the drama of AIDS that burst in the mid-1980s and that in addition to Haring’s life will also take away those of numerous friends.

Next, Art Night features the documentary Walls and Murals by Antonio Demma, a Deriva Film production, which chronicles street art in Rome, with debut works and interviews with young people who are now established artists on the international scene. Art Night is a program by Silvia De Felice and by Massimo Favia and Marta Santella. Directed by Andrea Montemaggiori.

On Rai 5 an evening on street art with documentaries on Keith Haring and urban art in Rome

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