The streetwear brand Hurley, which is known for surf and swim apparel, has released a capsule collection inspired by Keith Haring, one of the most recognizable and oft-licensed American artists.
The collection includes cotton T-shirts, board shirts, bucket and trucker hats, bathing suits, and sweatshirts for men and women, with prices ranging from $28 (a black mesh trucker hat featuring one of Haring’s blue dancing figures astride a two-legged figure that looks like some kind of dolphin/human hybrid, standing in the waves) to $100 (a reversible one-piece women’s bathing suit featuring dancing daisies on one side and an allover flower print on the other).
Haring died of AIDS-related causes in 1990, at age 31. By then he was internationally known for his graffiti-inspired artworks and recurring motifs like the radiant baby, dancing figures, barking dogs, UFOs, and pulsing hearts. His subway drawings, done in white chalk on the black paper filling empty frames where advertisement were placed, became so popular that collectors and fans would follow Haring onto trains, snatching the drawings as soon as her finished them.
Haring, in fact, was one of the earliest artists to experiment with blending art and commerce, opening his famous Pop Shop in Lower Manhattan in 1986. During his lifetime, Haring balked at many commercial licensing opportunities; it was only after his death, and the eventual closure of the Pop Shop in 2005, that the Keith Haring Foundation dedicated itself to a licensing model as a way to support Haring’s activism related to HIV advocacy and inner-city arts education.
