A Bigger Message: Conversations with David Hockney - Hardcover

Gayford, Martin

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0500238871 ISBN 13: 9780500238875

Publisher: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 2011

Synopsis

A unique self-portrait of one of the most influential artists of our time

Sparky, illuminating and entertaining – here is a decade’s worth of conversations between David Hockney and art critic Martin Gayford that explore via anecdote, reflection, passion and humour the very nature of creativity.

David Hockney is possibly the world’s most popular living painter, but he is also something else: an incisive and original thinker on art. Here are the fruits of his lifelong meditations on the problems and paradoxes of representing a three-dimensional world on a flat surface.

How does drawing make one ‘see things clearer, and clearer, and clearer still’, as Hockney suggests? What significance do different media – from a Lascaux cave wall to an iPad – have for the way we see? What is the relationship between the images we make and the reality around us? How have changes in technology affected the way artists depict the world?

The conversations are punctuated by wise and witty observations from both parties on numerous other artists – Van Gogh or Vermeer, Caravaggio, Monet, Picasso – and enlivened by shrewd insights into the contrasting social and physical landscapes of California, where Hockney spent many years, and Yorkshire, his birthplace. Some of the people he has encountered along the way – from Henri Cartier-Bresson to Billy Wilder – make entertaining appearances in the dialogue.

Table of Contents

1. Turner with an iPhone · 2. A Yorkshire Paradise · 3. Drawing · 4.The Trap of Naturalism · 5. The Problems of Depiction · 6. A Bigger and Bigger Picture · 7. Scale: A Bigger Studio · 8. Seeing More Clearly · 9. Drawing on a Telephone and in a Computer · 10. Painting with Memory · 11. Photography and Drawing · 12. Caravaggio’s Camera · 13. Way Out West: Space Exploration · 14. Cleaning Claude · 15. Movies and Moving through the Landscape · 16. Music and Movement · 17.Van Gogh and the Power of Drawing · 18. Drawing on an iPad · 19.The Power of Imges · 20. Theatre · 21. Lighting · 22. Nine Screens on Woldgate

About this title

Review:

Hockney's comments about drawing and about looking are very useful, not just in understanding his work and career, but also in general.

...Hockney offers insights into the art of painting, be it on touchscreen or canvas. The book is a walk up to "A Bigger Picture," the major Hockney show at London's Royal Academy of Arts.

Sumptuously illustrated, this radiant volume encapsulates what it truly means to be a visual artist.

In this charming book... the author conveys an awe for the intellect and drive of an artist.

An erudite writer and a wonderful artist in a book that feels like eavesdropping. It could be a literary painting.

From the Back Cover:

David Hockney is possibly the world's most popular living painter, but he is also something else: an incisive and original thinker on art. Here are the fruits of his lifelong meditations on the problems and paradoxes of representing a three-dimensional world on a flat surface. How does drawing make one 'see things clearer, and clearer, and clearer still', as Hockney suggests? What significance do different media - from a Lascaux cave wall to an iPad - have for the way we see? What is the relationship between the images we make and the reality around us? How have changes in technology affected the way artists depict the world? The conversations are punctuated by wise and witty observations from both parties on numerous other artists - Van Gogh or Vermeer, Caravaggio, Monet, Picasso - and enlivened by shrewd insights into the contrasting social and physical landscapes of California, where Hockney lives, and Yorkshire, his birthplace. Some of the people he has encountered along the way - from Henri Cartier-Bresson to Billy Wilder - make entertaining appearances in the dialogue.

About this edition

• Publisher: Thames and Hudson Ltd
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0500238871
• ISBN 13: 9780500238875
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 248