Masterpiece Story: Once Upon a Time by Keith Haring

While photographs of the bathroom are included below, the best way to see the entire piece is in this panoramic age-restricted video or through this Google Arts and Culture online exhibit.

The piece is a far cry from the playful Haring figures that you can find printed on t-shirts or a Coach handbag. Once Upon a Time is a homage to gay hedonism painted mere months before the openly gay artist died from AIDS.

The Center Show

Haring completed the mural as part of a group exhibit at The Center celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising, a series of protests often considered the beginning of the modern Gay Rights Movement. Other artists in the show included Betty Tompkins, Kenny Sharf, and Leon Golub.

Former Center president David Nimmons recalled the energy around preparing for the group show. “It really was this wild sense of people coming to make their statement…everybody was around 24/7, it seemed like, in the building hammering and painting and plastering and installing their video and pieces were going up several a day.”

Haring’s bathroom mural survives as the most striking piece from the show’s most famous artist. Former director of The Center, Glennda Testone, told the New York Times, “When I did walk in here for the first time, I said, ‘I have never seen so many penises in my life.’”

Still, in all its sexual gluttony, there is also celebration and defiance, especially at a time of rising AIDS rates and homophobia. “There was such shame and fear at the time, and he found a way to tap into sexual exuberance and celebration,” said Testone.

Rise to Fame

Keith Haring came to New York City in 1978 and took classes at the School of Visual Arts. There he found other young artists, most notably street artist Jean-Michel Basquiat. Like Basquiat, Haring saw opportunities on the walls and empty subway ad spaces in the streets of New York. He put up hundreds of line drawings all over the city in the early 1980s, building his brand.

At the same time, Haring started showing in galleries and international exhibitions. Andy Warhol became a friend and mentor to both Basquiat and Haring. Haring’s work, with its simple lines and focus on mass production, fit well within the pop art aesthetic.

Haring’s popularity and prominence grew, both artistically and culturally. He was seen out with celebrities, including art buddies Warhol and Basquiat, but also with pop stars like Boy George, Madonna, and Grace Jones.

Altruistic Work

“Touching people in a positive way is as close as I can get to an idea of religion,” Haring wrote in his journal in 1986. While his work grew more and more valuable, he also took on many philanthropic projects and produced work aimed at creating social change.

His 1986 Crack is Wack mural is still on the streets of New York today. That same year, he traveled to Germany to paint the Berlin Wall. He completed several murals with high school students, including a 6-story tall Statue of Liberty for the monument’s 100th birthday and a 488-foot long mural in Chicago.

In 1987, Haring was diagnosed with AIDS. A self-described workaholic, he continued to make art. “My life is my art, it’s intertwined,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “When AIDS became a reality in terms of my life, it started becoming a subject in my paintings. The more it affected my life, the more it affected my work.”

He created numerous pieces aimed at bringing attention to the AIDS epidemic and promoting safe sex. Haring gave his time and money to the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, reportedly donating wads of cash he pulled from his backpack, sometimes as much as $10,000 at a time.

Keith Haring and The Center Today

In 2012, The Center restored the flaking paint and deteriorating walls of the bathroom space and brought Once Upon a Time back to its former glory. It’s currently open to the public and free to view.

In the fall of 2020, the Keith Haring Foundation auctioned off part of Haring’s art collection, including works by Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Kenny Scharf, and Roy Lichtenstein. The foundation donated $3.7 million raised by the auction to The Center, the largest donation the organization had ever received. The Center used the money to build the Keith Haring Community Wing. Several works from The Center Show survived and can still be seen in the building today. However, Keith Haring’s Once Upon a Time, in all its graphic homosexual revelry, is the undeniable star.