Grace Cathedral sits atop one of San Francisco's tallest hills, its spire stretching skyward. The sweeping grand staircase beckons people to a set of gilded bronze doors cast from 15th century originals. A new piece of art now awaits visitors just beyond the magnificent doors: Keith Haring's The Life of Christ. It is the artist's last work, completed two weeks before his death from AIDS in 1990.

A bronze and white gold altarpiece based on a traditional Russian religious icon, the work is the generous gift of an anonymous donor. It was unveiled on December 1, 1995, World AIDS Day, and is the centerpiece of the cathedral's AIDS Memorial Chapel. Another edition of the altarpiece is installed at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City.

For those accustomed to seeing his work on T-shirts and notecards, a spiritual altarpiece created by Haring may be hard to imagine. Yet within the panels' delicate curves, the artist's familiar linear style provides a burst of modern energy. In the center panel, the Christ child is held by a multi-armed figure, caught between tears and a radiant heart. Angels float and gyrate on the side panels. The crowd below is swept up in the emotional chaos-dancing, reaching, moving, living.

"This is a piece of art that speaks to many people," says Signe Mayfield, curator of the Palo Alto Cultural Center. "It's rare when art can do that." After exhibiting the work in 1994, Mayfield began the effort to have it reside permanently in San Francisco.

Conscious of the artist's role in society, Haring believed in bringing his art directly to the people. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, he produced nearly 5,000 paintings on empty billboards in the New York subways. As he grew in his art, exploring issues and themes, the human mosaic that rides the subway witnessed and shared in the process. And developed millions of individual impressions about Haring's work. "That's the wonderful thing about art," Mayfield explains. "As an interpreter, you bring your own experience to the piece, and that makes the work come alive."

Learn more about the AIDS Quilt and how you can help. The NAMES Project at www.aidsquilt.org

Similarly, the artist's personal experience is the core of the creative process. Russian artists would fast and pray before working on religious icons to infuse their work with emotional and spiritual significance. Although short, Haring's life provided a range of experiences that are reflected in the altarpiece. His artistic success, pop celebrity and role as social activist carried him on an adrenaline rush of fame. Yet Haring lost many friends and a lover to AIDS, and at the time he created the altarpiece would soon succumb to the disease. These feelings of exultation and sadness play across the panels of his last work.

Haring made no preliminary sketches for the altarpiece. As he drew his freeform figures into the wet clay for the molds, he realized the intensity of the imagery he was creating. Haring finished the drawings and selected the bronze and patina for the castings-but never saw the work in its final form.

One of three panels from the Haring Altarpiece

Mayfield feels that The Life of Christ is a positive and universal piece that will re-energize people. This broad appeal is the basis for the cathedral's interest in the work. The church is visited by thousands of people from around the world each year, and contains a small treasure of art that spans centuries. In the small Chapel of Grace, a medieval altarpiece echoes the images in Haring's work, the pained faces of the crowds illustrating a darker time in human history.

The role of the artist is to interpret and translate life. With his simple and accessible style, Keith Haring developed a remarkable visual language. He used his now familiar symbols-the barking dog, the radiant baby, the dancing person, the heart-to encourage thought and dialogue about social and political issues. Like his subway drawings, these have an impermanence as time passes and society changes. Yet in the enduring medium of bronze and gold, Haring shares his experience of a more personal and universal human concern, one that will never change-the quest for spiritual understanding and hope as life comes to a close.

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