David Hockney is so famous that almost everyone has seen at least one of this artist’s paintings in their life. But at the same time, it is quite hard to define David Hockney’s style, as the painter has evolved technically and artistically during the last decades.
David Hockney’s exhibition at the Tate Britain is said to be the “fastest-selling one in the Tate’s history” and presents an extensive selection of the artist’s works. Let’s discover David Hockey’s first retrospective since 1988…

One of the world’s greatest living artists

David Hockney (born 1937) has been, whether you like his art or not, a major artist since his early sketches in the 1960s, when he was very successful while still a student at the Royal College of Art. I really enjoyed this exhibition, which shows a large amount of paintings, drawings, photographs and videos, all classified by periods and styles. I did not know much about David Hockney’s work or life before, but I’ve learnt a lot at the Tate Britain about this talented and prolific artist.

Questioning the conventions

David Hockney seems to use Art as a way to challenge the others’ perception of things. His choices of colors, perspectives, techniques, are always made to incite the viewer to look more deeply in his art.
I particularly like his painting “Kerby (After Hogarth useful knowledge), 1975“. The perfect lines and colors, the way the artist plays with perspectives (like Hogarth before) in this painting, show David Hockney’s interest for creating unrealistic scenes which look realistic.

A technical approach

David Hockney always tries to paint reality with an accurate sense of details. We can see in several paintings how he succeeds in capturing the transparent aspects of water or glass.
Like in these paintings ” Peter getting out of Nick’s pool, 1966” or “Study of water, Phoenix, Arizona“.

He also worked on a series of still lifes and landscapes, where he created a naturalistic rendering of the depth, contrasts and light. I liked his beautiful painting “Mount Fuji and flowers“…

David Hockney worked from the late 1960s on naturalistic  representations of humans. I was very impressed by the Painting called “Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy, 1970-71“. The faces and light effects are incredibly realistic. This exhibition enhances David Hockney’s ability at drawing and capturing the slightest details of life.

In the 1980s David Hockney started to use photography in a cubist way. With a Polaroid, he created portraits made of several snapshots from different viewpoints. The result is a gridded multifaceted image which I particularly admired, called “Billy Wilder and wife, 1982“.

His work in the 1990s is mainly focused on landscapes with vivid colors, which reminded me of the Fauvism movement. Like the “Canvas study of the grand canyon”.

Recent experimentations

He used several videos on his car to capture different views of a road, in the different seasons (“The four seasons project”). Then he gathered them together to obtain a multi-screen video, like a cubist film. Each season in each wall of the room: this gigantic project was amazing. Very poetic and innovative, I liked it a lot.

The use of the Ipad has also become a habit. It is said it almost replaces his sketchbook. The end of the exhibition shows many  videos of the drawings David Hockney made with his ipad. It’s like having a drawing lesson from the master! And as many people in the last room, I could not take my eyes off his work…
When finally leaving the exhibition, I heard a mother tell her young daughter: “You could learn to do that too, my darling”. And I think this is what symbolizes David Hockey’s art the most: its apparent simplicity, which hides in reality an incredible talent that -unfortunately- not everyone can have…

To find out more about David Hockney:
– an article from the Guardian,
– the Tate Britain presentation of the exhibition,
– David Hockney’s official website