David Hockney has done it all. Born in Bradford, England in 1937, Hockney studied at Bradford School of Art before graduating with a gold medal from London's Royal College of Art in 1962. Perhaps best know for his Swimming Pool paintings and portraits of friends and family, he has worked in multiple media including painting, drawing, photography, printmaking, Polaroid photo-collage, opera stage and costume design. The fearless artist does not shy away from experimenting with new techniques nor technology, having produced works on fax machines - "a telephone for the deaf," as he describes the now archaic device (from an Oct.15, 2009 NYTs article), photocopiers, laser and inkjet printers, computers, and even iPhones (using the Brushes App). He has had about 400 solo exhibitions, has taught at universities, and has received numerous honors and awards. He conducted extensive research and wrote a book titled Secret Knowledge: Rediscovering the lost techniques of the Old Masters (2001) which examines the history of the use of optical devices in art.
It's been 12 years since Hockney has exhibited new work in NYC, so Pace Wildenstein has understandably dedicated two galleries (West 25th and East 57th Streets) for David Hockney: Paintings 2006-2009. I saw his landscapes at the West 25th Street location last week. The 16 oil paintings depict Yorkshire, an Eastern section of England Hockney was first introduced to "while working on a farm during the summers of 1952 and 1953" (from the exhibit's press release). He later returned east to a seaside resort town called Bridlington after his sister moved there and was later joined by their mother. Hockney bought them a house there in 1989 (where he currently lives). Hockney also made frequent trips to Bridlington in 1997 to visit his ailing friend, Jonathan Silver. The many visits made Hockney see the English landscape "with new eyes" and he began painting Yorkshire from memory in Los Angeles (where he's lived since 1978) until he returned (temporarily, he says) to Bridlington full-time in 2005 (from the Times article). Initially, the large, multi-panel works are surprising, depicting landscapes, nature, in unnatural, intense colors, but after a longer look, the pink dirt roads, lavender tree bark, orange timber, and purple shadows look beautiful and feel calm and just right coming from Hockney's unconventional perspective.
To create his multi-canvas paintings, Hockney "divided the full expanse of a painting among several canvases, and each morning transported a few of the canvases to the field, mounting one or more at a time onto easels. Returning to his studio at the end of the day, Hockney combined the parts to form the whole image, resulting in large-scale multi-canvas paintings such as Bigger Trees Nearer Warter, captured in the winter and summer of 2008, on view in the 25th Street gallery, and The Big Hawthorne (2008) at 57th Street, each composed of nine canvases and measuring 108 x 144" (from the press release). Currently, his largest painting measures 40 feet wide!
Though Hockney was greatly influenced by Picasso, I see more hints of Van Gogh in these landscapes, in terms of the brush strokes and vibrant colors. I'll hopefully get a chance to check out the 57th Street gallery soon and post about it here. To learn more about the current two-venue exhibition, see Pacewildenstein.com. To learn more about Hockney, check out Hockneypictures.com. And read the New York Times' interview at NYT.com. Through December 24th.
Winter Timber, 2009
Woldgate Woods, 30 March - 21 April, 2006
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