Flowerpower, 2025

Kenny Scharf   Master Artists

Kenny Scharf is an American painter who lives in Brooklyn, New York. He received his B.F.A. in 1980 with a major in painting at the School of Visual Arts located in Manhattan, New York City.

Scharf's works consist of painting pop culture icons in a science fiction setting, such as the Flintstones and the Jetsons. He is most well known for his work in the 1980s interdisciplinary art scene.

Kenny Scharf was most known for his work in the East Village, Manhattan art scene of the 1980s, with shows at Fun gallery (1981) and Tony Shafrazi (1984), before seeing his work embraced by museums, such as the Whitney, which selected him for the 1985 Whitney Biennial. It was during this time that he did the cover art for the B-52s' fourth studio album, Bouncing off the Satellites.

Scharf was friends and former roommates with graffiti artist Keith Haring and appears in the documentary "The Universe of Keith Haring". With Keith, Kenny Scharf created the first of his blacklight disco installations called "cosmic closet" in the closet of their Times Square apartment. That project has grown and morphed into its most recent incarnation, "Cosmic Cavern". In 2004, he appeared in The Nomi Song, a documentary about his friend, opera singer Klaus Nomi.

In 2010, Kenny Scharf collaborated with Joe Grillo and Laura Grant of Dearraindrop, an artist collective from Virginia Beach, for a show at The Hole NYC curated by Kathy Grayson. Kenny Scharf has had featured exhibits at the Monterrey Museum of Contemporary Art, Miami Center for the Fine Arts, and the Queens Museum of Art.