In 1978, Haring moved to New York City and enrolled in the School of Visual Arts. It was here that he found a thriving alternative art community that was developing outside of the gallery and museum system, with events and exhibitions taking place in the downtown streets, subways and nightclubs.

In 1990, at the age of 31, Keith Haring died of AIDS-related illnesses in New York. Since his death, his work has been the subject of several international retrospectives. His work is in major private and public collections including The Museum of Modern Art; The Whitney Museum of American Art: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; The Art Institute of Chicago; The Bass Museum, Miami; Centre Georges Pompidou and Musee d’Art Moderne, Paris; Ludwig Museum, Cologne; and Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam. The exhibition Keith Haring: 1978-1982, most recently on view at the Contemporary Arts Center in Cincinnati and co-organized by Kunsthalle Wien, will open at the Brooklyn Museum in April 2012.