David Hockney, A Bigger Picture, Royal Academy Jan - Apr 2012‏

This is not hot off the press, since the exhibition has already closed, but we just managed to squeeze under the wire at the Royal Academy. The exhibition was truly wonderful and very inspiring. I have never been a particularly big fan of David Hockney, though to be fair I haven't seen a lot, I just associate him with boys diving into swimming pools in California. However in the last few years he has spent a lot more time in Britain and rediscovered his home county of Yorkshire, and the association has been very fruitful. Many trips over the same ground from his mother's house in East Yorkshire to visit a sick friend inspired him to paint views of the Yorkshire Wolds, and he has done what seems to be the best representation of British countryside since ... well, possibly ever. There were many paintings in a very naturalistic style which are a breathtaking reminder of just how beautiful the British countryside often is, and staggering by their sheer number, hung much more closely together than the Royal Academy normally would do (apart from the summer exhibition), yet somehow it works. He had several very large scale collections of similar views done in different seasons, which adds a lot to the appreciation.

As well as more naturalistic styles, he brought in several other ways of working, e.g. many paintings of certain dead trees which he was fascinated with, or lanes in all weathers. Although many of the paintings were in relatively realistic colours, he adds dimensions by using some more vibrant artificial-looking colours, and some works were completley done with imaginary colours, making a very striking effect. Echoing some older works which used collages of overlapping and uneven photographs to make a cubist look, he had several large works done in panels which don't quite join up, adding a frisson of cubism to an otherwise relatively natural-looking set of works.

Extending the panel/cubist theme further, he and an assistant produced some video works in panels, made by driving the same route many times over with multiple cameras in complementary positions, sometimes overlapping, sometimes at slightly different angles, providing fascinating effects which make you wonder why it hasn't been thought of before (as far I know).

He also did an homage to the French painter Claude Lorrain, recreating and reinterpreting his Sermon on the Mount painting many times over in different ways. It didn't seem altogether successful to me, but it was certainly an interesting idea.

The largest room was given over to a huge collection of works which he apparently produced specifically for the exhibition and that room. I don't know what will happen to them afterwards (there certainly aren't many living rooms big enough to take it!), as he produced a monumentally large painted work at one end of the room, and then 51 works printed from ipad drawings. I had no idea that an ipad could be used in this way, but he has explored and mastered it and produced a great variety of wonderful effects, some surprisingly natural-looking, though always with some give-away air brush look to them, but nevertheless very good works, and surprisingly they don't look pixellated, considering they have been enlarged from a relatively tiny drawing pad to full-size paintings. Amazing.

He said in some exhibition notes that anyone could take the idea of painting the same view in different seasons, for instance in their own gardens, and he makes it look easy. However it only took a few minutes with a sketch book to remember that it certainly isn't!

An old master and a living artist at the same time, it is amazing to be at what seems to me to be the peak of his powers, still inventing new techniques, so late in life (born 1937). It's a good thing there isn't a mandatory retirement age for artists!