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The Artist: Kenny Scharf
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Kenny Scharf (born in 1958, in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California) is an American painter who lives in Brooklyn, New York. The artist received his B.F.A in 1980 at the School of Visual Arts located in New York City. Scharf's works consist of popular culture-based shows with made up science-related backgrounds. Scharf came to prominence in the 80s interdisciplinary art scene making sparkly, pop-ed and monstrous paintings and installations. Scharf uses images from the animated cartoons popular during his childhood, such as The Flintstones and The Jetsons. In 2002, he released a cartoon of his own, "The Groovenians", and the show was originally supposed to air on Cartoon Network but it never got picked up.
Scharf was a key figure in the East Village art scene of the 1980s, with shows at Fun gallery (1981) and Tony Shafrazi (1984), before seeing his work embraced by museums, such as the Whitney, which selected him for the 1985 Whitney Biennial. He did the album covers of The B-52's in the mid-80s. In 1995, Scharf designed a room at the Tunnel nightclub in New York. Scharf was friends and former roommates with graffiti artist Keith Haring and appears in the documentary "The Universe of Keith Haring". In 2004, he appeared in The Nomi Song, a documentary about his friend, opera singer and new wave star Klaus Nomi.
With Keith Haring he created the first of his blacklight disco installations, called “cosmic closet” in the closet of their Times Square apartment. That project has grown and morphed into its most recent incarnation, “Cosmic Cavern,” with Scott Ewalt in Kenny’s Brooklyn building’s basement where he held amazing parties in 2009 & 2010. Kenny and Dearraindrop spotted each other across a crowded Deitch Art Parade in 2005 and have been collaborating through the mail ever since. They share a love of cartoons, thrift stores and street junk, underground comics and graffiti, customized clothing, technical painting, collaging and hot glue gunning.
Kenny Scharf explains:
My ambition as a professional artist is to maintain the course that I set nearly 20 years ago by establishing my work in the fields of painting, sculpture, and performance. Every project I undertake is building on my past experiences. My original approach is unchanged; it is a personal challenge to produce the best work possible every time. One very important and guiding principle to my work is to reach out beyond the elitist boundaries of fine art and connect to popular culture through my art. My personal ambition has always been to live the example. I believe the artist has a social responsibility to engage others in a thought process that ultimately brings art into everyday life thereby enhancing the quality of our experience.
For more information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenny_Scharf
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