For years, if not decades, KAWS’ iconic characters seemed to float in and out of pop-culture with a sort of omnipresent familiarity and yet not a folkloric backstory. They showed up on the street, in paintings, in sculptures and in vinyl toys so often that they permeated the contemporary art landscape in a way so very rare. Again, it was a character you almost had to say you knew because you knew you saw it. It wasn’t until KAWS’ brilliant exhibition of sculptures at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park in England where the story started to coalesce for me: here was a larger-than-life representation of the things we leave behind; whether childhood, memories, family drama or even just the feeling of…