David Hockney leaves behind art that endures

David Hockney has created a large and diverse body of work ; there are a number of Hockney works that people with a good general education should certainly be familiar with.

These well-known Hockney artworks can be found in hundreds of publications about the artist and in our Hockney short portrait ; here in this detailed look, we present a number of works and art projects by David Hockney that are usually hardly noticed:

“We Two Boys Together Clinging” was recorded on the RCA in 1961 .

This first official statement by Hockney regarding his homosexuality (which was still illegal in England at the time) is named after a poem by the American poet Walt Whitman , with whom Hockney was intensively studying at the time.

In 1963, Hockney created the “Domestic Scene Los Angeles” , which was followed in 1964 by another pretty naked bottom, “Man Taking Shower in Beverly Hills”

In 1963, Hockney also created his first “trick picture” under the title “Play within a play” : gallery owner John Kasmin, standing on a theater stage and pressing his face against a pane of glass – but perhaps he is only part of the canvas that covers the entire background as a stage set?

Hockney first achieved widespread recognition with more living-room-friendly splashing paintings; here is the most beautiful, “The Splash” from 1966, auctioned at Sotheby’s for $5.35 million to an unknown buyer and since then lost in private hands (but not the most famous, that is the “Bigger Splash” , which is presented in the Hockney short portrait).

In 1967, David Hockney painted “Savings and Loan Buildings” , a captivatingly perfect composition upon closer inspection, featuring blue sky, orderly architecture with a mirrored facade, subtly restrained nature, and one of his first completely incorporeal declarations of love for California.

This restraint towards naturally occurring compositions, which is perceived as highly appealing by people with a sense of or longing for clarity, is repeatedly evident in Hockney's work, here in the meticulously compiled photo collage “The Four Seasons” (of Woodgate Woods) from 2010/11.

In 1968, Hockney portrayed the art world luminaries Henry Geldzahler and Christopher Scott , and in the same year, "The Print Collector (Portrait of Felix Man) ." Early in his career, he demonstrated his ability to capture the mood and attitude of people.

Metropolitan Museum of Art from the 1960s onwards ; he was as innovative as he was controversial, and the painter Christopher Scott was his partner.

According to Geldzahler, the portrait marks a turning point in David Hockney's work because with this picture he abandoned the idea of ​​becoming a "modern artist" and instead decided to develop his own talent freely and without coercion.

That an artist is not bound to one style is something that Picasso fan Hockney is said to have learned from his hero; according to the accompanying text to the 2017 retrospective at the Tate (“David Hockney”, 9.02. to 29.05.2017 Tate Britain, London), the result was an oeuvre (far removed from Pop Art) with influences from Abstract Expressionism , Naturalism and Cubism (see monopol-magazin.de ).

How well Hockney succeeded in developing his astonishing talent for reproduction could already be compared to this portrait: Geldzahler was one of the first curators to treat artists as equals, which led to many friendships and to him also being portrayed by Frank Stella, Larry Rivers, Alice Neel, George Segal, Marisol (Escobar) and Claes Oldenburg .

According to news.artnet.com, the double portrait Geldzahler/Scott was offered for sale at Christie’s London on March 6, 2019, with an estimated starting bid of $37.75 million…

While the “static nature of the figures” is so often criticized in these and other Hockney portraits, it can surely be countered that Hockney’s static poses possess highly vibrant qualities. Either “static” is not a useful criterion in itself, or the term is inappropriate; for in all his portraits, Hockney captures the personality of his subjects better than most photographs of people engaged in lively sports.

In 1971-1972, Hockney demonstrated his tremendous feeling for material, color and transparency “Still Life on a Glass Table”

From 1976 onwards, Hockney experimented with photographic works in mosaic-like arrangements and found success with this art form. Here is the portfolio “Twenty Photographic Pictures” from 1976, number 4 of which, from an edition of 80, was auctioned for $35,000 at Christie's spring 2016 sale: christies.com .

“Study of Water, Phoenix, Arizona” was also created in 1976 , shown here in the color offset poster from 1995 (produced for the exhibition “David Hockney. Drawings 1954-1994. A Drawing Retrospective” at the Hamburger Kunsthalle, 1995).

From 1979/80 is the “Lithographic Water made of lines” with amazingly flowing lines.

“Canyon Painting” brought more color into play; surpassed by the intense “Nichols Canyon” in 1980, which seems to draw the viewer's eyes through/over the arranged depiction of Nichols Canyon in Hollywood.

In 1982, “Billy + Audrey Wilder, Los Angeles, April 1982” were combined in 144 Polaroid images to create a shimmering, vibrant portrait with a cubist touch.

From 1993 to 1995, Hockney dedicated a series of paintings to his dachshunds Stanley and Boodgie. He is later said to have remarked about them: “People don’t understand these paintings. They haven’t understood that they are about love and nothing else.” (quoted from petrahartl.at ).

These dachshunds were also present when Hockney painted a BMW 850CSi in 1995:

In 1997, Hockney created one of his most beautiful landscape paintings “The Road across the Wolds” ; a tranquil, less sprawling, less aggressive version of the famous “Garrowby Hill” from 1998.

In 2001, David Hockney published the book "Secret Knowledge" (in German: Geheimes Wissen. Verlorene Techniken der Alten Meister wieder entdecken von David Hockney, Knesebeck, ISBN 3-89660-092-3), following extensive and active research. In this book, Hockney theorized that Western art, from the Renaissance onward, was able to make such enormous strides in realism and precision of representation primarily because artists were able to utilize optical aids such as the camera obscura, curved mirrors, and so on for the first time.

The physicist Charles M. Falco supported Hockney; the theory became known in art history and led to many conferences and heated discussions because the use of photographic techniques is only really well documented by artists of the 19th century.

In 2005, Hockney experimented with a series of single and double portraits, which he painted directly on the canvas without prior photography or drawing. This resulted in the “Self-Portrait with Charlie” by Hockney and his friend, the New York curator Charlie Scheips.

In 2007, Hockney painted “Bigger Trees Near Warter” between Bridlington and York, a sight that makes every northerner feel instantly at home.

In 2010, Hockney created his version of the Sermon on the Mount, “The Sermon on the Mount II (after Claude)” . “After Claude” refers to the French Baroque painter Claude Lorrain, one of the main developers of the landscape painting genre, whose lyrical-romantic style with its cheerful atmosphere is known as “idyllic-Arcadian”, but which is certainly surpassed by Hockney in terms of its friendly mood.

In 2012, Hockney designed a huge large-scale painting (176 m²) for the Vienna State Opera, which was shown in the 2012/2013 season as part of the exhibition series “Iron Curtain” conceived by museum in progress.

From 2013 are the following portraits of the artist John Baldessari , the publisher Benedikt Taschen, and the art critic Martin Gayford. These photographs of the depicted individuals impressively demonstrate how accurately David Hockney was able to capture the essence of a person.

In 2015, this lush garden leisure, but not the now 78-year-old artist, who was preparing his latest works for the exhibition “David Hockney: Current” at the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, from November 11, 2016 to March 13, 2017. Here is a look through the exhibition catalogue:

On September 26, 2018, David Hockney unveiled the stained-glass window in Westminster Abbey, which he designed on his iPad and dedicated to Queen Elizabeth II The Queen's Window depicts a clear and vibrant deep blue sky above blossoming hawthorn along a country lane through the Yorkshire Wolds, the range of hills in the English county that Hockney so loves.

This was just a small, stimulating glimpse into the vast world of David Hockney; there is infinitely more of his art to discover. It is likely to generate considerable interest in the near future, as on November 15, 2018, David Hockney's "Portrait d'une artiste (Pisquine avec deux personnages)" from 1972 changed hands at Christie's New York for $90,312,500.

Among living artists, David Hockney holds the price record; overall, he also has a respectable position in the list of the most expensive paintings, ranking 17th after Leonardo da Vinci's "Salvator Mundi" , five Picassos, two Modiglianis, and one each from Bacon, Pollock , de Kooning, Klimt , Munch, Basquiat, Lichtenstein , and Hopper…

Eternal Art by David Hockney

Those who don't have 90 million euros to spare can see David Hockney's work "somewhat more affordably" – in the more than 70 public collections of countries that have already turned their art into museums, which can show people more than national (military) history.

Anyone who is currently doubting the meaningfulness of our Western culture could consider how few countries this is; this would certainly strengthen their resolve to combat the negative developments in this culture

• Australia: Queensland Art Gallery Brisbane
• Belgium: Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst Ghent
• Denmark: Louisiana Museum of Modern Art Humlebæk
• Germany: Hamburger Kunsthalle, Museum Ludwig Cologne, Museum of Modern Art Frankfurt am Main, Kunstmuseum Bochum, Daimler Contemporary Berlin, Sprengel Museum Hanover, Museum Würth Künzelsau, Museum DKM Duisburg, Alison & Peter W. Klein Collection Eberdingen, Pinakothek der Moderne Munich (Stoffel Collection)
• Finland: Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art Helsinki, Aboa Vetus & Ars Nova museums Turku
• France: Centre Pompidou Paris
• Greece: Frissiras Museum Athens
• Great Britain: Royal Academy of Arts, Tate Britain, Royal College of Art Galleries London; Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Manchester Art Gallery, Abbot Hall Art Gallery, Walker Art Gallery, Whitworth Art Gallery, Pallant House Gallery, Leeds Art Gallery, National Museum Cardiff, Southampton City Art Gallery, Salts Mill Gallery Saltaire, Bradford, West Yorkshire
• Ireland: Crawford Art Gallery Cork
• Iran: Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art
• Japan: Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, National Museum of Modern Art Kyoto, Kawasaki City Museum
• Canada: Vancouver Art Gallery, National Gallery of Canada, Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery, Museum London, Carleton University Art Gallery, Nickle Galleries
• Macedonia: Museum of Contemporary Art + Osten Museum of Drawing Skopje
• Netherlands: Museums Vledder Drentse
• Norway: Astrup Fearnley Museet for Modern Art Oslo, Henie Onstad Art Center Høvikodden Bærum
• Austria: Museum of Modern Art Ludwig Foundation, Vienna
• Portugal: Berardo Museum, Centro de Arte Moderna, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian Lisbon
• Switzerland: UBS Art Collection
• Spain: Centro de Arte Dos de Mayo + Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza Madrid
• Türkiye: Huma Kabakcı Collection Istanbul
• Hungary: Ludwig Museum of Contemporary Art Budapest
• USA: Museum of Modern Art New York, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Walker Art Center Minneapolis, MOCA Grand Avenue Los Angeles, The Art Institute of Chicago, Museum of Fine Arts Boston, The Getty Center Los Angeles, Smithsonian American Art Museum Washington, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art Kansas City, The High Museum of Art Atlanta, Currier Museum of Art Manchester New Hampshire, Columbia Museum of Art, Figge Art Museum Davenport, Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art Utah State University Logan, Castellani Art Museum Lewiston, Harry Ransom Center Austin, Robert V. Fullerton Art Museum California State University San Bernardino, Brauer Museum of Art Valparaiso Indiana
• Zaire: Unisa Art Gallery South Africa Pretoria

(Please inquire before departing for one of these museums, as the complete collection of a museum is not always on display.)

Future, teaching, adepts

The Queen's Window will certainly not be Hockney's last work of art; David Hockney is only 85 and still paints... for example on the iPad , where he has achieved admirable mastery with the simple program brushes.

David Hockney began passing on his knowledge very early: in 1962/63, David Hockney taught at the Maidstone College of Art , an independent art school, now part of the University College for the Creative Arts with locations in Canterbury, Epsom, Farnham, Maidstone, Rochester, and has produced, for example, Walking Dead illustrator Charles Adlard, cover artist Roger Dean, and fashion designer Zandra Rhodes.

Soon after arriving in the USA in the summer of 1964, Hockney received a teaching position at the University of Iowa. In 1965, he taught at the University of Colorado, Boulder College, and in 1966/67 at California University in Los Angeles. Further teaching positions followed until 1967 at the University of Colorado in Boulder, in Los Angeles, and in Berkeley. In 1969, Hockney even held a visiting professorship at the Hamburg University of Fine Arts.

Meanwhile, many other artists have engaged very personally with Hockney's work, e.g., the Moroccan artist Soufiane Ababri , who uses various media such as drawing, photo-video, installation and performances to question homosexuality, racism and history, among other things, and is already known as the new David Hockney (see hurriyetdailynews.com ).

the French artist Zevs exhibited his modern version of Bigger Splashes, a series called “Big Oil Splashes,” . Here, the splashing involves oil, which runs black from the logos of Exxon, Esso, Chevron, Shell, and Total into the pool, polluting the water.

A few more tips about Hockney and his art

Just as David Hockney's art, with its diverse nuances, can delight a wide variety of people, you can also use his art as a direct model in many directions:

• For the cover of the Christmas card: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/378/411003866.jpg
• For the wallpaper that never gets on your nerves: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/387/111002257.jpg
• For new fabric patterns: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/335/100701403.jpg
• For young, wild graffiti artists: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/325/410705504.jpg
• For Merkel commemorative postcards: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/404/112002009.jpg
• For political statements: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/411/411301830.jpg
• For posters against climate change: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/390/111002246.jpg
• For cynical feminist fairy tales: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/430/411600688.jpg
• To encourage older children to paint: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/381/111001734.jpg
• For skeptical greetings: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/420/111002250.jpg (bonnie also means pussy…)
• For timely conflict resolution: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/max/434/411610359.jpg
• For the pool in the bathroom, which requires no work except for framing: 81.169.222.198/still/kunst/pic570/322/100700933.jpg

Hockney's first autobiography, "The World in My Eyes," published in 2005, covers the years 1973 to 1992 and is available in German from Kurt Liebig Verlag under ISBN 978-3-938715-00-0.

We have compiled a collection of important Hockney paintings

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Direct contact with the artist (albeit channeled via the forms “Information Request” or “Reproduction Request”), current and upcoming exhibitions and of course plenty of Hockney work of all kinds (digital works, drawings, graphics, paintings, photographs, sketchbooks, stage works and etcetera) can be found on the official website www.davidhockney.co .

Further current exhibitions featuring Hockney's works can be found artfacts.net/artist/david-hockney/234

In 2016, coinciding with the "Bigger Splash" event, David Hockney's Bigger Book at the Frankfurt Book Fair . This exclusive "exhibition" for private spaces was conceived jointly by publisher Benedikt Taschen and David Hockney. The 50 x 70 cm book artwork is a truly exceptional art book, comprising 500 pages and thirteen fold-out pages spanning two meters.

For this reason, and because of its weight of 35 kg, the Big Book is sold with its own book table designed by Australian designer Marc Newson. A thick companion book containing sketches and graphics, posters, portrait photographs, archival material, critical reviews, and Hockney's art-theoretical reflections is also included.

The limited collector's edition of 9,000 copies, each individually signed by David Hockney, cost €2,000 in 2016. The 1,000 copies of the "Art Edition," consisting of 4 x 250 signed prints of an iPad drawing by Hockney, sold for €4,000 and are now sold out.

David Hockney's method mastering digital painting is a fun game for art enthusiasts with good networks, or simply a nice idea to copy :

I draw flowers every day on my iPhone, and send them to my friends so they get fresh flowers every morning. And my flowers last. “Not only can I draw them as if in a little sketchbook, I can also then send them to 15 or 20 people who then get them that morning when they wake up.”

(see telegraph.co.uk , an article by none other than Martin Gayford, whose portrait was mentioned above).