David Hockney: A Bigger Picture [Hardcover]

Marco Livingstone (Author), Margaret Drabble (Author), Tim Barringer (Author), Xavier Salomon (Author), Stuart Comer (Author), Martin Gayford (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 2012

David Hockney, one of the world’s greatest living artists, is creating some of the most significant work of his long career, painting the landscape and changing seasons of his native Yorkshire. These large, colorful works are the capstone of his engagement with nature, not only in England but also in the American Southwest, through the media of painting and photography. This book, the catalog of the first major Hockney museum exhibition in many years, offers a glorious view of the landscape as seen by the artist, and it includes not only his recent paintings but also his iPhone and iPad drawings. Essays by leading art historians—as well as a more literary piece by novelist Margaret Drabble and Hockney’s own reflections on his recent work—explore Hockney’s art from various perspectives.

Praise for David Hockney:

"Supplemented with numerous essays by art critics and Hockney himself, this is a mesmerizing volume of an established artist who continues to assert his dynamic relevancy." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

 "This glorious volume showcases this unique and exhilarating body of work, which celebrates the pulse of life in trees, fields, flowers, and clouds over the great cycle of the seasons . . . The enlightening commentary is merely prelude to a swoon once the reader turns to the 300 resplendent color reproductions." —Booklist, starred review

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Marco Livingstone is an art historian and independent curator and the author of numerous books about postwar art. Margaret Drabble is an English novelist, biographer, and critic. Tim Barringer is the Paul Mellon Professor of the History of Art at Yale University. Xavier Salomon is the curator of Southern Baroque paintings at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Martin Gayford is a writer focusing on art and jazz.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Abrams; 1 edition (March 1, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 9781419702808
• ISBN-13: 978-1419702808
• ASIN: 1419702807
• Product Dimensions: 12.1 x 11.3 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #108,368 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 34 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Sumptuous January 24, 2012

By Lost John

Format:Hardcover

Please note: Amazon's note on some pages on which this review appears suggests my review is of the French edition. Sadly, I have not seen the French edition; this review is of the original English edition.

This is a sumptuous book, well justifying its meteoric rise to best-seller status on the January 2012 opening of the London Royal Academy of Arts exhibition which it served as the catalogue. (The exhibition moved on to Bilbao, Spain for May to September 2012 and will be in Cologne, Germany from October 2012 to January 2013.) The large, almost square format lends itself well to the several hundred full color reproductions. Some works extend across two pages, but the problem so common with art books of key features being interrupted by, or even disappearing into, the page fold seems not to occur with Hockney. Or perhaps this is just very superior book design.

Like the exhibition, the book majors on Hockney's recent work centered on a relatively small patch of England's East Yorkshire. Without abandoning his Californian base, Hockney has spent much time in recent years in East Yorkshire, observing in particular the changing seasons as reflected in the lanes, trees and fields. Hugely prolific in several media, he returns time and again to the same single-track road - a one-time Roman road, apparently - the same tunnel of trees, and some more open views across fields, tram-tracked in their season by outsize farm machinery. His painting style frequently echoes that of Van Gogh, and we are reminded that Van Gogh too produced large numbers of rustic pictures.

A photograph presented as the first of no less than seven splendid frontispieces seems to indicate that Hockney reproduces the physical features of his landscapes very much as in life. He changes perspective and color tone, but trees, hedges and gaps in hedges remain very much as they are. The detail of some subjects is given closer attention on some of his visits than on others. There is a huge amount for us to observe, and this book makes it possible to do so at leisure, over as long a period as we wish.

Whilst the book majors on recent works made in East Yorkshire, significant space is given to earlier work in Yorkshire and elsewhere, including the renowned Grand Canyon series. Not quite amounting to a retrospective, this provides a liberal setting of context. Hockney also shares with us his 2010 series based on Claude Lorrain's 1656 painting, The Sermon on the Mount; something very different, although still outdoors. And towards the end of the book we have photographs taken by Hockney (with acknowledged assistance) with banks of nine and eighteen cameras - with words of explanation by Hockney on the genesis of that project and on why nine (or 18) cameras are better than one. He surmises that the new technology will enable new kinds of narrative, as the movie camera did ninety years ago. He has of course long been one to embrace new technologies as they arrive.

Essays by Hockney's fellow Yorkshire person, the novelist Margaret Drabble (they were born less than two years apart), three eminent curators, the author of the companion volume A Bigger Message: Conversations with David Hockney, and Tim Barringer, Professor of Art History at Yale University, complement the wealth of Hockney generated material. In all, this book puts many another best-seller in the shade. Hockney's preferred shade, we surmise, would be that of his beloved Woldgate as the trees there grow into their early summer splendor. In all its seasons, he has done Woldgate proud, and us too.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Refreshing New Appreciation of David Hockney March 2, 2012

By Grady Harp HALL OF FAMETOP 50 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

While David Hockney lived in California he was impressed with the quality of light, constantly testing it in his paintings of the canyons and shores of Los Angeles and environs. Now that he is back in his native England he has emerged as a landscape artist as fine as any painting today. He is less concern with photorealism in the way that brilliant landscape artist Martin Greenland paints: he is more interested in the influence of shapes and relationships of plants, trees, paths, skies and clouds - his way of illuminating what we see everyday in a fresh manner that is most arresting.

The world to this point has lauded David Hockney as a figurative artist and his reputation as such will remain intact. But is refreshing to see how this artists can take on any subject - through paint and paper and canvas, print, photomontage, sketch - and each new path leads us to a deeper appreciation of his gifts. This book is beautifully designed and the commentaries are additive instead of 'compulsory'. For every lover of contemporary art this book is a necessary addition to the library. Grady Harp, March 12

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars It's been a long time since I felt such a sense of wonder March 30, 2012

By Jeff Strack

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I saw Mr. Hockney's exhibit in London, and I must have this book. This is not a proper book review, as I have ordered but not yet received it, but I can only hope that the book captures the delight I experienced at seeing his work in this exhibit. If it only capture a tiny fraction of what I remember, it is worth every penny.

We planned a vacation in London in large part to see this exhibit and the Lucian Freud exhibit that was showing at the same time. I was expecting to be disappointed - after all, with the expense of a trip to London for a vacation, the bar is set rather high to see something spectacular. It was nothing like I expected. I thought I would miss the boys in the swimming pools, but I quickly forgot everything I thought I knew about this artist.

I have never seen such a well organized yet intimate exhibit - David is clearly not bashful. The paintings, large and small, drew me in, and refreshed my view of the wonder in nature. I was a small boy seeing his first tadpole. He even showed his practice paintings, as I call them - works that reflected his journey rather than the destination (I hope the journey continues for some time - David, take your vitamins).

I think simple is very hard - and what David showed is, at its heart, simple. His focus, joy, and delight at transforming (take no offense) bleary English landscapes into beauty to behold was a wonder. I saw what he saw.

Perhaps I am not a sophisticated arts critic, but I love color - orange, blue, and purple, bring it on. His painting spoke to us in a language seldom heard. Yes, it was crowded with people, children, and dogs (well, no dogs). That is what most museums are like, but the exhibit was so well managed and fit for the space that we did not care. I wish I could remodel my house to make it fit his paintings in the same way David made his paintings fit this space.

Five stars, or six if they would let me.