David Hockney

David Hockney is considered one of the most important and influential contemporary artists.
Following here's a visual biography of his most important and relevant works

1937: He is born on 7th july in Bradforshire, the fourth of five children, in a rural and working class family.

1953 - 57: He studies at the Bradford School of Art, receiving a traditional training based in drawing from life, producing figure studies, portraits and cityscapes.

                                                                                                     







Portrait of my father, 1955                                 Self portrait, 1955


1957 - 59: as a coscientious objector he works as a hospital orderly.

1959 - 62: He begins his studies at the Royal College of Art in London. Here he founds among his course mates some famous future artists as Derek Boshier, Peter Philips and Patrick Caulfield. Among the visiting artists are Francis Bacon, Richard Hamilton, Peter Blake and Richard Smith.
He get inspired from the Picasso's exhibition at the Tate gallery. In the meanwhile he wins the Junior Selection Prize at the Moores Liverpool Exhibition. He got inspired from the Poems of Walt Whitman and paints Doll Boy. He travels for the first time to New York where the curator of the Modren Arts Museum purchase some of his work. In 1962 he graduates with a gold medal. He travels the Europe visiting Berlin, Florence and Paris.

Doll Boy, 1961

Myself and my Heroes, 1961

1963: After moving in to Notting Hill he became more interestes in subjects as people in their houses and  shower paintings. He get his first exhibition and is a great success. He starts to get more and more in to the social life and his name is now famous to the media. In those years he also travel again to New York where he meets Andy Warhol, Dennis Hopper and Henry Geldzhaler.

 

 The First Marriage, 1963                                Domestic Scene, Notting Hill, 1963

1964 - 68: In '64 he travels to Los Angeles for the first time, meeting some of the most famous contemporary artist of the scene. He gets into photography and acrylic painting. He starts working at the Southern Californian Landscapes and at the first swimming pool paintings. He gets really inspired by the californian weather and climate, and his colours get more saturated and intense.He starts teaching at the Iowa university of arts. He got a succesfull exhibition in New York. In the next years he move in different parts of America, visiting the Grand Canion, the old Colorado Gold Mines and Disneyland. He teaches also at the university of Colorado and the University of California. In 1966 he meets Peter Schlesinger who became his favourite model and lover. Hockney get more in to the photographic media, especially as a way to reproduce paintings.

Beverly Hills Housewhife, 1966

A Bigger Splash, 1967

1969 - 73: During those years, Hockney keeps on working on his project about the double portraits and he experiments with various styles, from surreallism to realism. Disappointed by the wide angle perspective of the photographs with wide angle lenses, he creates multiple collages of pictures framing single small zones, composing huge panoramas and landscapes though a collage of them. His social life has a huge importance for him. He travels all over the world meeting a lot of famous artists, painters, photographers, filmakers and designers. In those years the relationship with Peter ends, with big influences on his works. He continues his swimming pool series, with the figure of Paul still showing out on his paintings. In 73 he starts working with lithographs inspired by japanese arts and at the dead of Picasso he creates a series of artwork commemorating him.

The Weather Series, 1973

The Student, Homage to Picasso, 1973

Pool With Two Figures

Mr and Mss Ossie Clark, Linden Gardens

1974 - 78: "A Bigger Splash" is released, an autobiographic movie that hurts the artist due to its personal contents, but still he allows its publication. He begins a relation with Gregory Evans. He gets more and more famous all over the world, opening various exhibition in many different important cities. He experiment more with photography and litography and start using oils again. His father dies. In this period he create a lot of work inspired from Pablo Picasso.

trailer of "A Bigger Splash" 

1979 - 82: He starts collaborating with The Metropolitan Opera of New York, creating the backdrops for the musicals. Affected by synesthesya, he can see colours from the music, and he uses this ability to translate visually the musical content of the rapresentations. He meet and collaborate with Ian Falconer, helping him with the designs. During his travel to china, he produces a series of quick watercolours based on his memory of the places he visited. Hockney starts thinking about the limits of the photographic media, which translate a tridimensional reality in a bidimensional one.He starts experimenting with polaroid composes first, and after with a Pentax camera. He realizes a huge photocollage of the Grand Canion.

Grand Canion, Photocollage

poster for the Metropolitan Opera House

poster for the Metropolitan Opera House

1983 - 87: He realize the famous photocollage of his mother, which remembers the cubism style for the fact that every picture has a slightly different point of view, as if the spectator is moving around the subject instead of just standing in front of him. He continues experimenting with rìthis style realizing the Pearlblossom Highway. He also experiment with a compuret program that allows to paint with light. He will come back to the digital media only much more time in the future, with the new technology from the Ipad and Iphone.
He experiments with other new technology media of the time, creating home made printings from photocopies. He takes further this using laser photocopiers and printers, making copies of his works or adding photocopied material to his paintings.

Mother I, 1985

Pearlblossom Highway, 1986

Cover for frrench Vogue, 1986

Self Portrait (with fotocopied shirt), 1984

1988 - 93: He start protesting and get more involved for the anti-omosexuals laws in England. He starts realizing a series of portraits of friends and family members which fax to the people portraited in them. For over six months he sends pictures all over the world under the name of The Holliwood Sea Picture Supply Co. Est. He realizes his first drawing on a computer using a Mac, and printing it with a laser toner. He purchase his first digital camera and starts experimenting with it. He also investigate further in the matter of space and shapes with his opera's background paintings.

river model landscape from Die Frau Ohne Schatten

Ian Falconer (digital camera) 1990

1994 - 99: He got inspired by the brilliance of the colours of Vermeer's paintings beginning a new series of portraitures and paintings with oils. He stills travel a lot in America, but he also realizes a series of oil landscape of the Yorkshire. He paint "A Bigger Grand Canyon", realized with sixty different canvases mounted together. After, "A Closer Grand Canyon" pictures the same subject but totally based on memory, and not on the photographic media. He also discover the "Camera Lucida" (the same thing in photography of the camera obscura) a tool that, basing on Hockney's opinion, allowed the old renaissance masters to paint the reality as close as possible to the real. Of course this has create huge debates among historians and art experts.

Garrowby Hill, 1998

A Bigger Grand Canyon

A Closer Grand Canyon

2000 - 2005: Hockney explores further how the artists of the past used Camera Lucida to create their stunning paintings. He publish a book: Secret Knowledge: redescovering the lost tecniques of the Old Masters. He also realized a documentary for the BBC explaining and recreating some of the most famous ancient paintings. He paints also real size portraits without previous drawings.

David Hockney's Secret Knowledge for BBC

Self Portrait With Charlie, 2005

2006 - 20012: Hockney continues his series of painting about the landscapes of the Yorksire. He develops a metod to paint on a big scale painting on multiple canvas. In this works, he has been weaking up at almost 4 in the morning to capture all the different gradients of colours that enlight the landscapes, as trying to demonstrate how the eye perceives things differently from a photographic camera. He also wants to show how those landscapes are special to him. as places where all his old memories return. He's holding an exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts called " A bigger picture". Here he represents landscapes of the wood surroundings of his studio in the Yorkshire. He paint with new media as Iphone and Ipad and he is amazed by the possibilities of those tools. He's amazed on how technology makes things simple and better and also how a screen based on "light" can bring life to the colours.

A BIGGER PICTURE

IPHONE DRAWINGS