For art lovers, the autumn months have much to offer. Major new museum exhibitions and gallery shows have already been announced. New moments of inspiration, new memories to cherish are about to be made.
Anticipation, in the lyrics of the 1971 Carly Simon song, may be “keeping me waiting.” But, like the melancholy figure in David Hockney’s Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures), I am not ready yet to let go – emotionally – of the summer of 2025.
There certainly have been some wonderful spring/summer exhibitions this year. Anne and I have more than a twinge of regret at the closing of Sargent and Paris at The Met. And then there are the exhibits that eluded our reach and our grasp.
Installation view of David Hockney 25 at the Fondation Louis Vutton showing Hockney's Bigger Trees near Warter or ou Peinture
sur le Motif pour le Nouvel Age Post-Photographique, 2007
David Hockney 25 differs from the previous major Hockney retrospective, which was presented at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2017. Although significant highlights of Hockney's early work are on view, the major emphasis is on his experiments in art during recent years. Hockney's digital art, created by using iPhone, iPad and photographic drawing is a new, unprecedented genre and certainly worthy of the amount of attention it receives in the exhibition.
Installation view of David Hockney 25 at the Fondation Louis Vutton, showing Hockney's 27 March 2020, No. 1, and other landscapes
Many of the art lovers who are fortunate in being able to travel Paris to see David Hockney 25 are likely to be familiar with Hockney's iPad drawings from illustrations in books or magazines. They will be able to see these digital works at first hand. Lucky them ... but there is no reason for "sour grapes" from the rest of us.
To view Hockney's digital art between the covers of a book is no second-class substitute. Indeed, the moving account by Hockney, detailing his use of iPad drawing during the Covid-19 crisis, is positively crucial to understanding this tremendous artistic undertaking.
This "essential reading" was co-authored by Martin Gayford. Spring Cannot be Cancelled, details how Hockney, living at his country home in Normandy, France, responded to the tragic effects of pandemic and quarantine, which blighted countless lives. Hockney, working at great speed, used his iPad to record the arrival of spring with a plethora of closely-focused images.
The sights of spring, once taken for granted, were denied to many in 2020. David Hockney restored the balance, harmony and beauty of nature.
David Hockney, 27 March 2020, No. 1, 2020
Spring Cannot be Cancelled was published by Thames & Hudson in 2021. For several years, this inspirational book was the "essential reading" selection of Art Eyewitness. Martin Gayford's How Painting Happens is currently in this slot, but Spring Cannot be Cancelled has lost none of its insight and power.
Over the years, T&H has functioned as the source of a stream of books about and written by Hockney. Three recent T&H titles are keeping the David Hockney "bookshelf" well-stocked.
The three volumes are the catalog of David Hockney 25 (328 pages/$60), The World According to David Hockney, a collection of Hockney quotes and aphorisms (176 pages/$19.95), and the revised edition of the classic Hockney's Pictures (496 pages/$50).
Let's have a look!
The first volume on our bookshelf is the catalog of the exhibition at Fondation Louis Vutton. As expected, the curators of the museum and the staff at T&H have pulled-out all the stops to produce a book which is truly a work of art in its own right.
Two aspects of this magnificent book are worthy of some reflection - beyond noting the awesome quality of its many, many illustrations.
As stated earlier, the Fondation Louis Vutton exhibition and its catalog concentrate of Hockney's recent work, especially his numerous series of landscapes and portraits, executed in oils, acrylic paint or digital media. Hockney's enthusiastic use of the full artist's tool kit of the twenty-first century does not imply the displacement of traditional techniques by cutting-edge technology.
David Hockney, In the Studio, 2019
Hockney, as he has done throughout his long career, uses whatever artistic medium suits his purpose, whatever best serves to help him realize his vision. There are recent charcoal and pen and ink drawings in the Fondation Louis Vutton catalog which are worthy of Ingres or Sargent, as well as inkjet printed computer drawings and iPad drawings.
Realizing "his vision" is paramount to Hockney - and key to understanding his genius. Hockney, with quiet deliberation has navigated his way through all the "isms" and agendas which have otherwise defined the art scene of the last sixty years. Winter Timber (2009) reproduced in a stunning, double-page spread in the David Hockney 25 catalog, is a good example of how Hockney has made his own individualistic mark.
Winter Timber depicts the landscape of eastern Yorkshire, painted in a non-naturalistic color scheme worthy of the Fauves. Rather than executing this work on a single, over-sized support, Hockney painted fifteen separate canvases, each measuring 36 x 48 inches. The component parts of the picture were then combined to form a unified image - 108 x 240 inches (274.3 x 609.6 cm).
An intriguing work of art, Winter Timber invites a wide range of interpretations. An impassioned plea for respecting the environment? A timely reminder to follow "the road less-traveled", in this case the path which veers off to right, past the purple tree stump?
David Hockney, Winter Timber, 2009
Hockney's response to such questions is to emphasize the importance of Winter -and thereby underscoring the resilience of nature. That's an unexpected comment from a man who reminded the world that "Spring cannot be cancelled."
"People have it all wrong imagining it to be a time when the world goes dead," Hockney has stated. "Trees are never more alive than in winter, you can virtually see the life force, thinned but straining, pulsing, the branches stretching palpably, achingly toward the light."
Earlier in this review, I compared Hockney (favorably) to Turner, but when it comes to articulate comments and lucid writing, there is no comparison. Hockney wins the day on both counts, as can easily be appreciated in our second book selection, The World According to David Hockney.
Here is a sample of what Hockney has to say on life, art, nature, technology and inspiration:
Looking is a positive act. You have to do it deliberately.
The world is beautiful and if we don't think it is, we are doomed as a species.
Art should be a deep pleasure. There is a contradiction in an art of total despair, because at least you are trying to communicate, and that takes away a little of the despair. Art has this contradiction built into it.
God, if you want to paint, just paint.
Essentially, Hockney's "words of wisdom" are subdivided into two groups: profound, incisive comments on art and spontaneous, heartfelt remarks, filled with the enthusiasm and joie de vivre which comes from making creative expression a part of one's daily experience.
One of the latter relates to a painting I much admired at the 2017 Met retrospective of Hockney's works: Contre-jour in the French Style - Against the Day dan le Style Francais, 1974.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2017)
David Hockney's Contre-jour in the French Style
- Against the Day dan le Style Francais, 1974
Forget for a moment any explanation of this striking, inimitable painting except what Hockney has to say about it:
I saw this window with the blind pulled down and the formal garden beyond. I thought, oh, it's marvelous, marvelous! This is a picture in itself.
My favorite quote combines Hockney's deep love of classic art and his unquenchable sense of humor. This quote is paired with his renowned 1967 painting, Mr. and Mrs. Clark and Percy. See how it strikes you!
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2017)
David Hockney's Mr. and Mrs. Clark and Percy, 1971
Somebody once commented that my double portraits are like Annunciations. There's always somebody who looks permanent and someone who's kind of a visitor.
The third volume on our bookshelf is Hockney's Pictures. Originally published in 2004, this updated and expanded new edition is a large-format paperback. The 522 illustrations, spanning Hockney's entire career, rival those in the Fondation Louis Vutton catalog for size, clarity and fidelity of color.
Page spread from David Hockney’s Pictures, published by
Thames & Hudson, showing Hockney's
Mulholland Drive: the Road to the Studio, 1980
The text emphasizes insights from Hockney rather than commentary by art scholars. Thus, Hockney's Pictures combines the virtues of the David Hockney 25 catalog and The World According to David Hockney.
Hockney's Pictures is arranged in thematic chapters which enable us to study in detail all of the many aspects of his oeuvre. I found the treatment of Hockney's use of photos, to create cubist-style collages, to be especially enlightening.
David Hockney, Mother I, Yorkshire Moors, August 1985, 1985
Age has not dimmed David Hockney's vision or curbed his creative output. Hockney is on record as stating that he feels 30-years of age when he picks-up a brush or sets to work on his iPad. There's not a hint of a "last chapter" in any of these three books.
For a summing-up, let's turn again to the Fondation Louis Vutton catalog of David Hockney 25. In an essay in this splendid book, the historian Simon Schama reflects on Hockney's capacity to convey pleasure as a defining characteristic of his art.
Comparing Hockney to the Gothic cathedral stained glass artisans, Schama writes:
Just as there was no division in that sacred work between makers and worshippers, Hockney's pursuit of visual joy, I think, has always presupposed his unaffected inseparability from those who are going to consume it.
At first, "consume" seemed an odd word to use in reference to Hockney's work, as if it were a commodity to be used-up. But, if we regard art - as Hockney creates it - as something essential to human well-being like food, then "consume" is the correct word.
David Hockney, Mt. Fuji and Flowers, 1972
Food for thought. Food for the soul. Brought to you by David Hockney and Thames & Hudson.
***
Text: Copyright of Ed Voves, all rights reserved.
Original photos: Copyright of Anne Lloyd, all rights reserved.
Introductory Image:
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2017) David
Hockney’s Portrait of an Artist (Pool
with Two Figures), 1972. Acrylic on canvas: 84 inches. x 120 inches (214
cm. x 275 cm.) The Lewis Collection. Photo was taken at the 2017 Hockney retrospective
at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
David Hockney (British, born 1937)
Portrait of My Father, 1955 (Oil on
canvas: 50.8 x 40.6 cm., 20 x 16 in.) and After
Munch - Less is Known than People
Think, 2023. Acrylic on canvas: 121.9 x 182.9 cm (48 x 72 in.) © David Hockney
David Hockney (British, born 1937)
Self Portrait with Red Braces, 2003. Watercolor on paper; 24 x 18 1/8". Huntington
Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, California. © David Hockney. Photo Credit: Richard
Schmidt.
Installation view of David Hockney 25 at the Fondation Louis
Vutton, Paris, showing David Hockney’s Bigger
Trees near Warter or ou Peinture sur le Motif pour le Nouvel Age
Post-Photographique, 2007. Photo courtesy of the Fondation Louis Vutton.
Installation view of David Hockney 25 at the Fondation Louis
Vutton, Paris showing David Hockney’s 27th
March 2020, No. 1 and other landscapes. Photo courtesy of the Fondation
Louis Vutton.
David Hockney (British, born 1937)
27th March 2020, No. 1, 2020. iPad
painting printed on paper, mounted on five aluminium panels, 364.1 x 521.4 cm
(143 ¼ x 205 ¼ in.) overall.
Cover Art of David Hockney 25. Published by the Foundation Louis Vutton and
Thames & Hudson 2025. Image © Thames & Hudson.
David Hockney (British, born 1937) In the Studio, 2019. Ink on paper: 57.47 x 76.84 cm (22.625
x 30.25 Inches) Private Collection. ©
David Hockney Photo Credit: Richard Schmidt
David Hockney (British, born 1937)
Winter Timber, 2009. Oil on canvas,
in 15 parts:. Overall: 108 x 240 in. (274.3 x 609.6 cm.)
Private collection. ©
David Hockney Photo courtesy of
Fondation Louis Vutton.
Cover Art of The
World According to David Hockney. Published by Thames & Hudson. Image ©
Thames & Hudson.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2017) David
Hockney’s Contre-Jour in the French style
– Against the Day dans le Style-Francais. Oil on canvas: 182.9 x 182.9 cm
(72 x 72 inches) Collection of the Ludwig Museum, Budapest. Photo was taken at
the 2017 2017 Hockney retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2017) David
Hockney’s Mr.and Mrs.Clarke and Percy, 1971. Acrylic on canvas: 213.4
x 304.8 cm. (84 x 120 inches) Tate Britain Museum. Photo
was taken at the 2017 David Hockney retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of
Art.
Page spread from David Hockney’s
Pictures showing Mulholland Drive - the Road to the Studio, 1980. Image © Thames & Hudson
David Hockney (British, born 1937)
Mother I, Yorkshire Moors, August 1985,
1985. Photographic collage: 46.99 x 33.02 cm (18.5 x 13 Inches).© David Hockney Photo Credit: Richard Schmidt
David Hockney (British, born 1937)
Mt. Fuji and Flowers, 1972. Acrylic
on canvas: 60 x 48 in. (152.4 × 121.9 cm) The Metropolitan Museum of Art. #1972.128 © David Hockney
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