Keith Haring’s final work lives in a church in Paris
From chalking subway stations in New York to completing ‘The Life of Christ’ just two weeks before his death, Keith Haring (1958–1990) believed art belonged to everyone. It’s only fitting, then, that his final work hangs not in a private collection but in a church at the heart of Paris.
Haring & Paris: a special bond
Haring’s relationship with the French capital ran deep. Long before he became a global icon, French collectors and critics were among the first in Europe to embrace his work. In 1987, he painted the joyful mural that still wraps the façade of Hôpital Necker–Enfants Malades, filling a children’s hospital with his trademark dancing figures and radiant babies. Nearly four decades later, it remains one of Paris’s best-loved works of public art.
Less well known is that Haring’s last completed work is in Paris, too. ‘The Life of Christ’, a bronze triptych completed just a fortnight before he died in 1990, was donated to the City of Paris in accordance with the artist’s wishes. After a spell on museum loan, it has recently returned to its permanent home in the Saint-Vincent-de-Paul Chapel of Saint-Eustache.
A message of hope
Often called the ‘artists’ church,’ Saint-Eustache is an unlikely but remarkable gallery. Alongside Peter Paul Rubens’ ‘The Disciples at Emmaus’ and contemporary works by John Armleder, Haring’s triptych feels entirely at home. Rendered in his unmistakable visual language of bold lines, exuberant figures and humor, Haring, who was dying of AIDS as he created ‘The Life of Christ’, conceived the work as a message of hope – for humanity, and especially for those facing the disease.
Today’s setting of the art work is no accident. During the AIDS crisis, Saint-Eustache was among the first Parisian churches to welcome and support people suffering from disease and their families at a time when many others turned them away. Few homes could be more fitting.
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