It was the earliest time I could view and the ticket has been on my wall for
months! The exhibition finishes on the 26th September and I'd be very
surprised if there are any tickets left.
It's moved from the galleries where they normally hold the Summer/Winter
Exhibition (because of the hang for 2021) to The Gabrielle Jungels-Winkler
Galleries in the Burlington Gardens part of the Royal Academy of Arts. It
appear they've maybe been hung closer together than in the video below of
the hang in the main galleries.
You can find the preamble introducing the exhibition on the RA website - and
new the works in this video
You can also download a large print guide of the paper publication you collect on going into the exhibition. This provides dates for th artworks but not times of day- which I think he did in previous exhibitions
Notes on an exhibition by David Hockney
There are no paintings in conventional art media - they are all done in
digital software on his iPad. There are 116 works in total.
These are the images released as press pics - but to be honest while some
are good they don't include the best ones. See if you agree with me when
you watch the video.
|
|
All works by David Hockney. © David Hockney Clockwise from top left: No. 125, 19th March 2020. iPad painting. No. 340, 21st May 2020. iPad painting. No.186,11thApril2020.iPadpainting. No. 118, 16th March 2020. iPad painting. No. 316, 30th April 2020. iPad painting. No. 88, 3rd March 2020. iPad painting.No. 370, 2nd May 2020. iPad painting. No. 259, 24th April 2020. iPad painting. No. 133, 23rd March 2020. iPad painting. |
The sum of the parts
The exhibition is greater than the sum of the parts and it's a mistake to
look at them as individual paintings
The impact of seeing them hung - in themes or series - close together on a
wall reminds me of exhibitions of Monet's Haystacks
(see Monet's series paintings - stacks of wheat (2008) - from which the following quote comes)
Monet was adamant that the series of paintings had an aesthetic quality of its own and that the value of the paintings could only really be appreciated when they were all seen together.
The artworks present well on the background of a dark teal wall. Some
would look like quite insipid on an ivory or light coloured wall - but
with a dark background they have more impact.
The series I liked the best included:
- The nocturnes - with very bright moons and deep blue skies - which interestingly were not hung together
- the blossom - trees / branches
- plants in pots - indoor and outside (eg 15 and 18 daffodils outside and in bowl indoors)
- pond paintings
- paintings of rain
Monet and series paintings in Normady
It then occurred to me that one of the features of Hockney is that he has
at various times reflected on various great artists of the past and
created his own interpretation of their works.
It struck me that it's no coincidence that he did these in Normany which
is Monet's "home turf" - and that Monet was particularly given to creating
series of paintings of the same motifs - seen in different weather /
seasons / time of day
A number of the motifs in this exhibition are portrayed in a similar way.
Seeing pictures
One of Hockney's skills is the ability to "see pictures". A lot of what
he's portraying is of absolutely no consequence. Indeed many have
commented that his paintings are similar.
I think those critical of the iPad paintings in this exhibition forget two
things:
- his age - there are very few artists who continue to create as well a they did in the past as they near he end of their life
- the context - However at a time when the world turned upside down, recording the simple and the familiar and looking closer at nature is something a lot of people did to help keep a grasp on what is real. (I took to posting my photos of plants every day on my Facebook account - from the same date in the past - to keep a grasp on the world outside when we were locked up at home - when Hockney was creating these artworks. Today I posted #492).
What I noticed was that some of the subjects he took great care over -
the notable examples being the trees in full blossom - while others
which held less interest (bare trees with no foliage) seemed to receive
less attention.
No 57 was particularly joyful and I was surprised not to see it chosen as
an image for the postcards.
The colour of skies
I realised partway round how important the colour of the sky was to some
of the images and what a variety of colours he had used for skies
Mark-making
He uses the mark-making available in his Brushes software - but I
sometimes want to see him experiment more with available software to see
what else it can do....
The mark-making hasn't really changed over the last decade. Which is a
pity.
The visitors
A very white set of visitors in terms of both skin and hair. It's always
interesting to see what older ladies think is appropriate dress for a
Hockney exhibition at the RA - but then right now, an expedition into
central London is something to appreciate and I dare ay a lot were going
out for a very nice lunch afterwards
Which I would have been too - but my ankle rebelled....
No comments:
Post a Comment
COMMENTS HAVE BEEN CLOSED AGAIN because of too much spam.
My blog posts are always posted to my Making A Mark Facebook Page and you can comment there if you wish.
Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.