Keith Haring is now remembered as one of the most influential artists of the 1980s — and a driving force of the pop art movement; however, Haring actually began his career as a guerrilla artist in the New York City subways. Even his famous “Crack is Whack” mural on 128th Street and 2nd Avenue in New York City was executed independently without the city’s permission as a warning to the public about the drug epidemic that swept through the city in the late ’80s. Haring devoted much of his career to creating public works that carried social messages.
The street artists profiled here all invoke the legacy of Keith Haring: their work is unsanctioned (although most of Haring’s works would later be commissioned) and meant to send a political, social or cultural message that creates dialogue amongst viewers.
This street artist’s purpose, artwork and identity are wrapped into his name (somewhere, Saussure is smiling: the sign has met the signifier). Space Invader literally “invades public spaces” with characters from the classic video game Space Invaders. His medium is another ’80s classic: Rubik’s cubes. “Going in a city with tiles and cement and invading it. This is the most addictive game I have ever played,” the artist (whose real identity remains unknown) told FormatMag.com. To date, he has “invaded” New York, Tokyo, Los Angeles and cities in Australia, and he never lets anyone know where he’ll “attack” next. He posts all of his “invasion maps” with locations of every invader on his website. His intention mirrors the infinite ways to twist a Rubik’s cube: “I don’t expect anything special from onlookers. I like the idea that there are as many reactions as onlookers.”
This Englishman is largely responsible for the current fascination with street art. For someone who has managed to remain anonymous, he gets around. The artist has managed to produce public works in England, the United States, Israel and even hang a painting (albeit for a very short period of time) in the Louvre. Little is known about Banksy’s true identity, but it is known that he started as a freehand graffiti artist before incorporating stencils into his work so he could paint more quickly and avoid colors blending together. Simon Hattenstone of Britain’s Guardian Unlimited is one of the only people who has interviewed Banksy face-to-face, and articles such as this September 2006 piece from BBC News Magazine that proclaim to know the artist’s true identity have been widely ignored. The public seems to want Banksy to remain an art vigilante, painting rogue and daring images throughout the countryside.
This April, Banksy released his first film, entitled Exit Through the Gift Shop. In the five-minute extended trailer on YouTube, we learn through Rhys Ifan’s narration that, “Street art was poised to become the biggest countercultural movement since punk.” Banksy may keep his identity a secret — he even created pieces to mock his own “unmasking”, but he clearly seeks the public’s attention and wants to send overt or subversive social messages through his work.
The creator of the iconic Obama “Hope” image launched his career as a street artist in the 1990s with his iconic “OBEY” stencils and stickers. According to Fairey’s Obey Giant website, the “OBEY” campaign was intended to “enable people to see clearly something that is right before their eyes but obscured; things that are so taken for granted that they are muted by abstract observation” (based on Heidegger’s phenomenology). From the OBEY campaign, Fairey began creating works of art for every arena: the streets, commercial purposes, graphic design and, of course, political campaigns.
At a recent retrospective of the past 20 years of his career, exhibition curator Pedro Alonzo wrote about the social impact of Fairey’s work: “The content of Fairey’s work is a call to action about hierarchies and abuses of power, politics and the commodification of culture.” Despite Fairey’s cultural impact, his guerrilla public works still continue to have a short lifespan. A mural he painted recently on Houston Street and Bowery to promote an upcoming show of his works at Deitch Projects in Manhattan has now been removed after stop work orders forced him to shut down the uncommissioned project.
Perhaps the most subversive and actually defacing street artist on this list, “Poster Boy” entered the public eye in late 2008. His chosen form of self-expression is “subway art manipulation;” his tools consist of razor blades and glue. By altering the advertisements in New York City subway stations, Poster Boy aims to send messages about politics and our saturated culture. In an interview with New York Magazine, he described what he does to subway ads in the following way: “Those advertisements and that saturation, it’s political. It’s anti-media, anti–established art world.”
It takes Poster Boy mere minutes to complete a “project.” He does not plan his works ahead of time. When the train is in the station, he scopes out the ads, and once the train pulls away, he starts cutting and manipulating. His social critiques, which have included rearranging the Iron Man title to spell out “Iran = Nam,” have an incredibly short lifespan that depends on how long it takes MTA workers to find them. Poster Boy’s intention is for the moniker to one day serve as the universal author for a decentralized art movement that makes the public question everything they see.
Other Guerrillas in Our Midst
Street art is everywhere, and it doesn’t always have to send a political message or make a countercultural statement. Here are a few current projects that are city-approved and thought-provoking at the same time.
Cyclists dumped 13 gallons of paint on one of Berlin’s busiest roads, and car tires became the brushes on a large, public canvas.The cyclists who planned the project were even thoughtful enough to post signs letting motorists know that the paint being used was waterproof and wouldn’t harm their vehicles.
The NYC Department of Transportation recently announced that Times Square will be getting a makeover this summer in the form of a street art project. Brooklyn-based artist Molly Dilworth’s design, “Cool Water, Hot Island,” was selected from 150 entries in a design contest held in March to be a part of the rejuvenation of Times Square. It consists of a “graphical representation of NASA‘s infrared satellite data of Manhattan,” looks like a wave and has the added bonus of 
special “cool blue hues” that are supposed to reflect more light to help cool down the hot street during the summer months.
Philadelphia’s Mural Arts Program
Okay, so this one was actually started in response to all of the graffiti and guerrilla street art that ran rampant in the city in the 1970s. Today, the Mural Arts Project helps beautify the city and gets people out and volunteering to help with new projects. Graffiti has also decreased since the program’s inception. You can even take tours of the city’s murals if you’re ever there for a visit (which I highly recommend).
Want more street art? Check out TIME.com’s photo essay featuring 20 more current street artists.
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Photos via Keith Haring Foundation Archives Blog, photo courtesy of Space-Invaders.com, phoro courtesy of Banksy.co.uk, photo courtesy of ObeyGiant.com, photo by Poster Boy NYC via Flickr, photo courtesy of MuralFarm.org.