Page 31 - Expotime10_11_2017

From the newsdesk New exhibitions

Team of Guggenheim Bilbao and Royal Academy, London

David Hockney: 82 portraits and 1 Still-life

Guggenheim Bilbao, untill February 25, 2018

The curator is Edith Devaney. The Exhibition was previ- ily, and acquaintances—include studio staff, fellow artists
ously shown in London featuring a remarkable new body such as John Baldessari, and curators and gallerists like
of work in which the British artist returns to portraiture Larry Gagosian.
with a renewed creative vigor, offering an intimate snap-
shot of the LA art world and the people who have crossed “Celebrities are made for photography,” says Hockney.
his path in recent years. “I don’t do celebrities, photography does celebrities. My
friends are my celebrities.” Each depiction—the result of
After the monumental and highly successful landscape intense scrutiny—becomes a kind of psychological explo-
exhibition David Hockney: A Bigger Picture at the Gug- ration. Each work is the same size and shows the sitter in
genheim Museum Bilbao in 2012, the artist turned away the same chair, illuminated by the bright, expansive light
from painting and his Yorkshire home and returned to Los of southern California against the same vivid blue back-
Angeles. He was recovering from a very difficult series ground. All were painted in the same time frame of three
of events, including a minor stroke, and he did not paint days.
for some time, which was unusual for him. Little by little,
he became reacquainted with the quiet contemplation of Thanks to Hockney's virtuoso paint handling, the uniform-
portraiture, and in the summer of 2013 he painted the ity of the key elements in each painting underscores the
first of what was to become a collection of over 90 por- differences between the sitters, allowing their personali-
traits, 82 of which can be seen in this exhibition. ties to leap off the canvas with warmth and immediacy.
In this exhibition, Hockney has created an intense, immer-
Hockney views these portraits collectively as a single body sive installation that reexamines the role of the painted
of work. The installation in near-chronological order per- portrait in an age when selfies and photo-portraits have
mits another psychological study: that of the artist him- proliferated in social media. The only non-portrait in the
self. His own emotional state seems to lighten throughout show, a Still-life, was created when one sitter was unable
the series, as does his conviction in the format and medi- to make his appointment and the artist, primed and ready
um. His subjects—all chosen from among his friends, fam- to paint, decided to portray what was available in his stu-
dio, a selection of fruit and vegetables.

A selectiobn of these
fascinating Hockney
portraits can be
found here:
https://www.roy-
a l a c a d e m y. o r g.
uk/exhibition/da-
vid-hockney-por-
traits

In the video select-
ed, you may watch
an interview be-
tween Hockney and
Edith Devaney.
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EXPOTIME!, issue October / November 2017