Keith Haring's Quotes

I don't think art is propaganda; it should be something that liberates the soul, provokes the imagination and encourages people to go further. It celebrates humanity instead of manipulating it.

The public needs art - and it is the responsibility of a 'self-proclaimed artist' to realize that the public needs art, and not to make bourgeois art for a few and ignore the masses.

When it is working, you completely go into another place, you're tapping into things that are totally universal, completely beyond your ego and your own self. That's what it's all about.

Nothing is important... so everything is important.

My contribution to the world is my ability to draw. I will draw as much as I can for as many people as I can for as long as I can.

Art is for everybody.

Drawing is still basically the same as it has been since prehistoric times. It brings together man and the world. It lives through magic.

I have been enlightened. I have fallen into poetry and it has swallowed me up.

See, when I paint, it is an experience that, at its best, is transcending reality.

Shapes that contain no inner components of positive/negative relationships will function better with other shapes of the same nature.

When I die there is nobody to take my place.

I think you have to control the materials to an extent, but it's important to let the materials have a kind of power for themselves; like the natural power of gravity, if you are painting on a wall, it makes the paint trickle and it drips; there is no reason to fight that.

People were more interested in the phenomena than the art itself. This, combined with the growing interest in collecting art as an investment and the resultant boom in the art market, made it a difficult time for a young artist to remain sincere without becoming cynical.

The dripping... well, if it happens, it happens; it does not take anything from the work. The dripping just proves that you were not trying to control the work, but the work was developing by itself and if it drips, it's a natural part in the evolution of the work.

There are some images that I will only use once, and not use again because they don't seem to really hit the nail right on the head, but there are some which are so strong they have to be reduced; sometimes just reusing them makes them stronger.

Treason doth never prosper, what's the reason? For if it prosper, none dare call it Treason.

From your confessor, lawyer and physician, hide not your case on no condition.