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Samsung Brings Keith Haring’s Subway Drawings to Life
The Samsung Neo QLED 8K and The Premiere 9 displays help transform Sotheby’s galleries into a NYC Subway Station – where Haring’s famous works were intended to be seen.
I n the late 1970s, Keith Haring moved to New York City to pursue art. While moving throughout the city, he became enraptured by the graffiti he saw scrawled all over countless subway stations. A few years later, Haring realized that some subway advertisements featured a blank black paper panel right next to them. In that empty space, he didn’t see a void but rather a medium. Soon Haring started doodling within Metropolitan Transportation Authority stations throughout the five boroughs – a selection of which will be on offer in Sotheby’s Contemporary Day Auction on 21 November 2024 , powered by Samsung.
Keith Haring New York City Subway Drawings
By turns playful and plaintive, Haring’s prolific set of drawings – featuring squiggly sketches of kinetic figures in white paint – rapidly earned him a cult following. Although he began exhibiting at galleries and museums all over the world around then, the ever-evolving nature of subway stations played host to some of the most exciting works of his career. Haring’s iconic subway drawings have been painted over in the decades since his passing in 1990. During an exhibition at Sotheby’s New York 8-20 November, the auction house is bringing this iconic period of Haring’s artistry to life with a breathtakingly immersive gallery. Powered by the immersive display technology of cutting-edge Samsung projectors and Neo QLED 8K TVs, the experience is sure to be one that visitors won’t soon forget.
For a moment, guests stepping into Sotheby’s new Keith Haring exhibit might feel like they’ve ventured below ground. That’s because the gallery has been transformed into a subway station, thanks to the immersive video experience projected by The Premiere 9 ultra-short throw projector from Samsung. Some of Haring’s rare original subway drawings, including the vivid and buoyant Untitled (Still Alive in ’85), are displayed in between these brilliantly realistic video projections. By creating this immersive experience, guests can view these rare subway drawings in an environment that feels like the very subway system they first appeared in.
As a trailblazing force in the consumer electronics industry, Samsung is constantly at the forefront of creative evolution. That’s why their advanced Neo QLED 8K and The Premiere 9 are central to making the Haring exhibit come to life. In addition to The Premiere’s sharp, clear projections of the subway system onto the walls, the Samsung Neo QLED 8K TV will be utilized to channel archival footage of Haring in this singular gallery exhibition.
As the flagship product within the Samsung TV lineup, this model features the best of what a modern television can offer, including a nearly-invisible profile, stunning 8K resolution and multi-dimensional sound. But one particular detail sets the Neo QLED 8K TV apart from the rest: state-of-the-art AI upscaling on the 8K displays means that archival footage of the artist, will not just be seen and observed within the gallery – they’ll be experienced in dazzlingly high definition.
No matter how familiar guests might be with the scope of Haring’s subway drawings, they’ve likely never seen them in their intended context. But Samsung has given guests the opportunity to see them in a new context. It’s fitting, since Haring himself not only considered the subway system critical to his own artistic development but also a force that kept his beloved New York City thrumming along. Three years after he began doodling on the subway, Haring wrote that his career had since taken off. Regardless, “the subway is still my favorite place to draw,” Haring wrote in 1983. “There is something very ‘real’ about the subway system and the people who travel in it; perhaps there is not another place in the world where people of such diverse appearance, background, and life-style have intermingled for a common purpose.”
As presenting partner of the New York Sales, Samsung will also be integrating additional facets of its cutting-edge technology throughout the exhibition. This includes Music Frame, The Frame and MICRO LED. These will be integrated into the gallery and auction room, in order to fully enhance the experience for Sotheby’s visitors this November.
