This month saw the opening of the Keith Haring retrospective at Tate Liverpool, and this is among the more-than eighty-five images that are on show in the first major UK exhibition of the artist. It succinctly drives home the artist’s unique, much aped style, and his marriage of serious activism and humour. The image was created as a poster for the Crackdown on Crack concert on 31 October 1986 in New York, which saw the likes of Crosby, Stills & Nash, The Allman Brothers Band and Santana perform in a bid to help combat the crack epidemic in the city. As with much of Haring’s work, it mixes playfulness, humour and bold colours with a serious message.
