Pop Shop II 1988

Curator: Immediately, I'm struck by this radiant joy emanating from the piece. It's like a concentrated dose of happiness. Editor: Indeed. Here we have "Pop Shop II," a screenprint realized by Keith Haring in 1988. Its vibrant palette and energetic lines are characteristic of his pop art style, and the graphic style of cartoon art and graffiti art as well. Curator: Cartoonish figures, like pictograms from some funky alien civilization. The thick, unwavering lines trapping those jolts of colour. What narratives do you glean from the figure bent double? Like a snapshot from a dance craze, a comical bow, or perhaps the weight of the world. Editor: I find his imagery powerful in how Haring transformed the signs and symbols that populate the urban landscape into a complex language, so even something as visually 'simple' as a bending figure can simultaneously suggest dynamism, and resilience but also, vulnerability or even collapse. Curator: Precisely. There is an interplay between a celebration of life and darker undertones—often linked to sociopolitical commentary such as the AIDS crisis, racial inequality, and dangers of drug abuse during that era. And even today, those tensions, like trauma, they feel lodged within our collective memory. Editor: The 'Pop Shop' itself was Haring's ingenious way to democratize art, to pull it from the elite gallery scene, by allowing mass production of objects like this screen print. In the 80s, many regarded this accessibility with suspicion. Today, however, there’s greater recognition that the man used symbols to amplify marginalized voices. Curator: What I admire about Haring's images is that each of them opens into so many stories and questions; one can engage in these works at multiple intellectual levels; there is space to reflect, and create meaning in his world that invites cultural memory as well as imaginative projection. Editor: A fitting testament to art’s ability to mirror ourselves and our society, then and now. A playful gesture laden with resonance and complex emotion.