Keith Haring Pop Shop V (Plate 4), 1989 is the fourth and final installment of the artist’s Pop Shop V portfolio of 1989. The print has two central figures that make of the majority of the composition. With a dolphin-like figure in pink dancing on the water with the orange human figure, Haring creates a fun and whimsical scene. The pink and orange contrast nicely with the purple of the sky and blue of the water in this brightly saturated print. Haring also added short black action lines around the figures, implying motion, sound and energy. Haring was fascinated by Egyptian hieroglyphs and how pictorial symbols could communicate thoughts and ideas. He created his own visual language of symbols and motifs that could be understood by anyone. Through this method, Haring is able to communicate non-visual concepts, like motion and noise.

Haring created multiple Pop Shop portfolios during the span of his career and derived the name from the original Pop Shop that he opened in a retail space in downtown New York in 1986. This shop was opened with the intention of making the artist’s work accessible to the general public, and this accessibility is an explicitly Pop sentiment.

Keith Haring’s Pop Shop V (Plate 4), 1989 is part of a portfolio of four screenprints in the artist’s Pop Shop III portfolio of 1987. This body of work depicts some of the artist’s iconic figures in a limited palette of black, pink, orange, blue and purple. Also featured in this portfolio are Pop Shop V (Plate 1), Pop Shop V (Plate 2) and Pop Shop V (Plate 3).

Created in 1989, 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 200 in pencil in the center right image.

Catalogue Raisonné & COA:

Keith Haring Pop Shop V (Plate 4), from the Pop Shop V Portfolio, 1989 is fully documented and referenced in the below catalogue raisonnés and texts (copies will be enclosed as added documentation with the invoices that will accompany the sale of the work).

1. Klaus Littman. Keith Haring: Editions on Paper 1982-1990, The Complete Printed Works. Hatje Cantz Publishers: New York, 1993. Listed and illustrated on pg. 149.

2. A Certificate of Authenticity will accompany this artwork.

About the Framing:

Framed to museum-grade, conservation standards, Keith Haring Pop Shop V (Plate 4), from the Pop Shop V Portfolio, 1989 is presented in a complementary moulding and finished with silk-wrapped mats and optical grade Plexiglas.