"You guys look familiar," Kenny Scharf said after he ushered me and photographer James Parker into his studio on a recent afternoon. "Yes, you remember!” I said. “You painted our faces two weeks ago at the last Cosmic Cavern!"
The Cosmic Cavern a Go-Go is a fluorescent party held in the basement of the Bushwick warehouse where Scharf lives and works. There’s a little bit of every Gen Y’s childhood lined in those Day-Glo-painted walls, which are packed from floor to ceiling in a cluster of plastic toys and junk that the artist has been collecting since the early '80s. Inside the cavern, Fisher Price cars and Barbie dolls hang from strips of shiny garland next to neon sculptures and installation pieces that have been exhibited in various galleries.
Kenny Scharf, along with the likes of Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat, is one of New York City's most beloved graffiti artists. His murals and tags are like vital organs to the city’s street-art history and his vibrant faces that grimace and laugh are familiar faces around the city. Seeing Scharf’s work is an event many New Yorkers gloat about; just a couple of weeks ago the artist drew a crowd down the street from our offices in Soho while he was putting up his piece Happymadnoselock. Kenny Scharf also has a lot of stories to tell, so we listened in intently about everything from his days as Keith Haring’s roommate, to dancing on stage at CBGB, to collaborating with Jeremy Scott, to being arrested.
SHANNAN ELINOR SMITH: Can you tell me a little bit about the birth of the Cosmic Cavern?
KENNY SCHARF: It started 1981 and it’s called the Cosmic Cavern, well, because it’s a big cosmic cavern! But the initial one was called the Cosmic Closet because it took place in a closet. There was a very funky, old house that I lived in with Keith Haring back in '81, and I found a closet in the house that was stuffed with garbage. And I was like, "Oh my god, real estate!" At the time, I had been collecting garbage and making art out of it. I happened to come upon a black light and some black-light posters. So, after I cleaned out the room I put the black-light posters with the black light and I got some of these pieces of garbage and I painted them fluorescent. Everyone started hanging out in there. It became this place to flip out.
When did you move it to this basement we are sitting above?
I’ve been here about eight years. I got here and I had this great big space, and giant basement. It floods when it rains a lot, so I can’t really live in there; I can’t store art in there. And I said, "Oh, this will be perfect, because it really is just garbage." But it’s traveled all over. It was in PS1, it got bigger there, and then it was in the Whitney Biennial in ’85. I’ve got another one in LA that traveled, and another one in Germany, in this box that comes apart—you walk inside. Some of the original pieces of crap are actually in the basement. They get moved around and re-assembled in different spaces.
I’ve heard you do most of your work and your murals by yourself. Did you assemble the Cosmic Cavern by yourself?
No, actually, [but] I’d say 90 percent [of this stuff] is mine. Some of it is costumes people leave after the party is over and I just put it up. There have been some donations of art by people I don’t