Name: Ludo 3
Brand: Keith Haring
Rating: 5 (235 reviews)

Track auction value trend

Keith Haring's Ludo 3, a signed lithograph from 1985, is estimated to be worth between £8,000 and £12,000. This is a rare artwork with an auction history of two sales since its entry to the market on 29th November 2007. The current owner can take advantage of an average annual growth rate of 7%. The edition size of this piece is limited to 90.

Meaning & Analysis

This signed screen print from 1985 is a limited edition of 90 from Keith Haring’s Ludo series. Depicted in the artist’s recognisable linear style, Ludo 3 shows a central figure rendered in thick, bold outlines, set against a backdrop of red squiggle and cross designs. The figure’s arms are twisting and flailing, with Haring’s characteristic energy lines to emphasise the sense of movement.

Haring utilises many of his idiosyncratic symbols in Ludo 3, notably showing a cross on the figure’s chest and portraying its head with a hole through the centre. Throughout his oeuvre, Haring has used these motifs in the context of figurative works such as his Pop Shop Quad series (1987) or Growing series (1988). Marked and porous figures are used to symbolise homosexuality, death and the emptiness felt by many during the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s.

Ludo 3 is a jarring composition due to the way that Haring has layered the figure against a frenzy of red lines. Reminiscent of Aztec or Aboriginal art through his use of flowing, organic shapes and thick bold lines, Haring creates a complex pattern that plays out across the image surface. Explaining why many of his works resemble Aztec or Aboriginal art, Haring has said “My drawings don’t try to imitate life; they try to create life, to invent life,” something that he believed aligned with so-called primitive ideas.