Keith Haring’s Apocalypse is a portfolio of ten screenprints created in 1988 in collaboration with the American writer William S. Burroughs. Among the most ambitious projects of Haring’s career, the series combines Burroughs’ fragmented narrative style with Haring’s vivid and often unsettling imagery to create a powerful vision of a world in flux. Unlike the artist’s best-known works, which often communicate through clear and accessible symbols, Apocalypse presents a more complex and layered body of work filled with themes of transformation, conflict, technology and social change.

William S. Burroughs was one of the leading figures of the Beat Generation and is best known for novels such as Naked Lunch. His experimental writing techniques, particularly the use of fragmented and rearranged text, made him one of the most influential literary voices of the twentieth century. For Apocalypse, Burroughs supplied a series of texts to which Haring responded visually, creating a dialogue between word and image that runs throughout the portfolio.

The ten prints showcase a darker and more intricate side of Haring’s practice. Familiar elements of his style appear alongside serpents, hybrid creatures, skeletal figures, machines and symbolic references drawn from religion, popular culture and mythology. Executed in Haring’s distinctive graphic style, the works are densely populated and highly energetic, rewarding repeated viewing as new details emerge.

For more information or to buy Keith Haring’s Apocalypse Complete Portfolio (Littmann PP. 98–109), contact our specialists using the enquiry button above.