Footage of artist Kenny Scharf from the ‘80s reveal a boisterous jester who comes off like a lost Beastie Boy; but in the present day, while his art still resembles the spirit of his early work, he’s more somber. What happened? That arc is explained in the documentary Kenny Scharf: When Worlds Collide. One might think Malia Scharf, who co-directed with the film’s editor Max Basch, is too close to her subject. After all, the artist is her father. But an introductory epigram from Pablo Picasso suggests she’s an apt choice: “All children are artists; the problem is how to remain an artist once you grow up.”
Scharf’s ‘80s heyday was indeed filled with childlike wonder and enthusiasm. He came up with young artists like Jean-Michel Basquiat and was particularly in tune with Keith Haring, whose radiating baby and distinct linework was a defining icon of the era. Scharf himself was unstoppable; a tour of his tiny East Village apartment reveals that Scharf decorated everything, from painting toasters and plastering the ceiling with Flintstones character heads to putting a ribbon on a broom.
The scene that surrounded Scharf and Haring was a DIY wonderland, with New York real estate at an all-time low and new voices converging from everywhere developing a bold, exciting aesthetic that was far outside the conventional gallery scene. But the friends and roommates became rivals when Haring’s star took off and visitors to their apartment looked right through Scharf as if he was invisible. The era’s conflicts weren’t just internal; one forgets that at the time the threat of nuclear annihilation was still hanging in the ether, and by the end of the ‘80s, AIDS devastated the community.
The subtitle When Worlds Collide comes from a 1985 canvas purchased by the Whitney that was one of Scharf’s largest paintings. That was when his star ascended, and, according to artist Ann Magnuson, “when it all started to unravel a bit.” When the mainstream world started to pay attention, “all that radical idealism was lost,” she laments. It seems obvious now that such a pop-minded aesthetic would become commodified, but it’s still sad to witness the quick turn from underground to commercial.
So it doesn’t feel like navel-gazing when, after addressing the AIDS years, Malia Scharf inserts childhood home videos. It may be banal to note that Scharf’s children were also his creations, but this relatively conventional aspect of his life speaks to Scharf’s vitality.
In one telling exchange, the artist tells his daughter, “I have a balancing act between being a responsible adult…and the Peter Pan syndrome, because I just feel like life is so much about the moment, so I want every moment fun and beautiful.” Malia answers: “But that’s now how life works.” Dad: “It’s not the reality.”
Scharf continues to work on public art projects in Los Angeles, but as his peers note, his moment has passed. It’s to the younger Scharf’s great credit that she offers a few critics pointing out the limitations of her father’s work, both from a market standpoint and an aesthetic view. When Worlds Collide is a colorful portrait of an artist and ultimately a touching portrait of a father. By the end, Picasso’s epigram is inverted, and it becomes a story of growing up.
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