1 00:00:00,600 --> 00:00:02,680 Welcome to Great Art. 2 00:00:02,680 --> 00:00:04,680 For the past few years, we've been filming 3 00:00:04,680 --> 00:00:06,760 the biggest exhibitions in the world 4 00:00:06,760 --> 00:00:10,080 about some of the greatest artists and art in history. 5 00:00:10,080 --> 00:00:12,160 Not only did we record these landmark shows 6 00:00:12,160 --> 00:00:15,080 but we also gained privileged access behind the scenes 7 00:00:15,080 --> 00:00:17,800 of the galleries and museums concerned. 8 00:00:17,800 --> 00:00:19,960 We then used the exhibitions as a springboard 9 00:00:19,960 --> 00:00:22,280 to take a broader look. 10 00:00:22,280 --> 00:00:26,560 In 2012, David Hockney, arguably Britain's favourite artist... 11 00:00:26,560 --> 00:00:28,920 In fact, there isn't much of an argument there. 12 00:00:28,920 --> 00:00:31,000 Anyway, he staged an exhibition here 13 00:00:31,000 --> 00:00:33,400 at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. 14 00:00:33,400 --> 00:00:37,800 Entitled A Bigger Picture, it was devoted entirely to landscape 15 00:00:37,800 --> 00:00:41,200 and proved to be extraordinarily popular. 16 00:00:41,200 --> 00:00:46,080 We filmed that show, but then waited until his next at the RA in 2016, 17 00:00:46,080 --> 00:00:50,560 which centred on portraiture with a little nod to still life, too. 18 00:00:50,560 --> 00:00:54,800 The two exhibitions brought in over 750,000 people, 19 00:00:54,800 --> 00:00:59,200 emphatically showing the appeal of an artist now into his ninth decade 20 00:00:59,200 --> 00:01:02,960 but showing few signs of losing his creative enthusiasm. 21 00:01:02,960 --> 00:01:06,080 Not only were we able to film these extraordinary shows, 22 00:01:06,080 --> 00:01:08,440 we were also able to interview David Hockney 23 00:01:08,440 --> 00:01:12,920 on both occasions in London and in his studio in LA. 24 00:01:12,920 --> 00:01:16,040 Our aim was to see if we could find out a little more 25 00:01:16,040 --> 00:01:19,240 about one of the most compelling artists in the world. 26 00:02:10,560 --> 00:02:12,840 (INAUDIBLE) 27 00:02:57,440 --> 00:03:01,960 David Hockney is one of several artists 28 00:03:01,960 --> 00:03:06,360 who emerged in Britain after the Second World War 29 00:03:06,360 --> 00:03:11,600 who took British art back up, I suppose, to a very high level, 30 00:03:11,600 --> 00:03:14,040 a level which it had been in the early 19th century 31 00:03:14,040 --> 00:03:16,160 with Turner and Constable. 32 00:03:16,160 --> 00:03:19,280 But after the second World War, with the advent of Francis Bacon, 33 00:03:19,280 --> 00:03:23,480 Lucian Freud, Frank Auerbach, David, some others, 34 00:03:23,480 --> 00:03:26,840 it went back to that very high level. 35 00:03:26,840 --> 00:03:30,080 And also, they collectively did something 36 00:03:30,080 --> 00:03:33,160 which, according to some art critics and historians, 37 00:03:33,160 --> 00:03:35,240 wasn't supposed to happen, 38 00:03:35,240 --> 00:03:39,720 which is that they put figurative art back centre stage. 39 00:03:39,720 --> 00:03:44,920 I think David Hockney is a quintessential British artist, 40 00:03:44,920 --> 00:03:47,800 and he's one of the great British artists 41 00:03:47,800 --> 00:03:53,600 because he's got these very British attitudes to painting, 42 00:03:53,600 --> 00:03:57,680 that he paints what he sees. He calls it eyeballing. 43 00:03:57,680 --> 00:04:01,600 He likes to eyeball a person or a landscape, 44 00:04:01,600 --> 00:04:06,880 and he's also... He's very interested in the history of art himself. 45 00:04:06,880 --> 00:04:09,200 He's very interested in theories of art 46 00:04:09,200 --> 00:04:12,040 and he's very aware of photography, 47 00:04:12,040 --> 00:04:14,760 and he's speculated on the connections and the differences 48 00:04:14,760 --> 00:04:17,320 between painting and photography - 49 00:04:17,320 --> 00:04:19,840 how does a painting resemble a photograph 50 00:04:19,840 --> 00:04:21,920 or how is it different from a photograph? 51 00:04:21,920 --> 00:04:26,720 And the conclusions he seems to have come to at the moment 52 00:04:26,720 --> 00:04:32,960 is that painting and drawing, it's about hand, heart and mind. 53 00:04:32,960 --> 00:04:36,840 It's about looking and seeing and also feeling 54 00:04:36,840 --> 00:04:39,960 and bringing all of that together in a way that you can only do 55 00:04:39,960 --> 00:04:42,080 by making a painting or a drawing, 56 00:04:42,080 --> 00:04:44,760 that you can't do if you just click a camera. 57 00:04:44,760 --> 00:04:50,040 There's that kind of simple honesty and bravery 58 00:04:50,040 --> 00:04:52,600 and, actually, an experimental quality 59 00:04:52,600 --> 00:04:55,560 that is to do with the nature of looking, 60 00:04:55,560 --> 00:04:59,560 all of which keeps his art fresh and keeps it good and important. 61 00:05:01,000 --> 00:05:04,440 The Royal Academy has a special relationship with David Hockney. 62 00:05:04,440 --> 00:05:07,640 He was elected a Royal Academician in 1991 63 00:05:07,640 --> 00:05:10,920 and has exhibited his work here regularly ever since. 64 00:05:10,920 --> 00:05:13,920 Edith Devaney is one of the senior curators at the Academy 65 00:05:13,920 --> 00:05:16,000 who's worked with Hockney over many years 66 00:05:16,000 --> 00:05:18,920 and has overseen both his major exhibitions here. 67 00:05:18,920 --> 00:05:21,520 In my role as contemporary curator, 68 00:05:21,520 --> 00:05:23,880 I am working a lot with living artists, 69 00:05:23,880 --> 00:05:27,360 and that's a very particular role in itself. 70 00:05:27,360 --> 00:05:30,400 And the ability to keep in touch with artists 71 00:05:30,400 --> 00:05:32,480 that you've worked with in the past, 72 00:05:32,480 --> 00:05:34,880 to get to know new artists to see what's happening 73 00:05:34,880 --> 00:05:37,280 is absolutely critical. 74 00:05:37,280 --> 00:05:39,920 There's also that thing that's very hard to define, 75 00:05:39,920 --> 00:05:42,280 and it's looking for the right moment for things. 76 00:05:42,280 --> 00:05:45,360 David's shows came about a little bit like that, 77 00:05:45,360 --> 00:05:47,880 but it was also because I knew him quite well. 78 00:05:47,880 --> 00:05:50,280 And I worked with him on a big work 79 00:05:50,280 --> 00:05:52,680 for that year's summer exhibition in 2007, 80 00:05:52,680 --> 00:05:55,040 where he wanted to take up one of the end walls, 81 00:05:55,040 --> 00:05:57,040 and that was all to do with landscape. 82 00:05:57,040 --> 00:05:59,800 And, of course, by that stage, he'd returned to Yorkshire 83 00:05:59,800 --> 00:06:03,200 and he was doing quite a considerable number of works 84 00:06:03,200 --> 00:06:05,400 focused on the Yorkshire landscape. 85 00:06:05,400 --> 00:06:07,840 And having the conversations with him 86 00:06:07,840 --> 00:06:10,200 around the production of that landscape 87 00:06:10,200 --> 00:06:12,880 made me think, "There's something more here, 88 00:06:12,880 --> 00:06:16,760 there's something that he hasn't completely tapped into." 89 00:06:16,760 --> 00:06:19,600 And I think his instinct is to explore this whole genre more 90 00:06:19,600 --> 00:06:21,680 and there's more to come. 91 00:06:21,680 --> 00:06:24,440 When I put it to him that, actually, we could do this show, 92 00:06:24,440 --> 00:06:27,880 filling the main galleries, just of Yorkshire landscapes, 93 00:06:27,880 --> 00:06:32,080 he loved the challenge and it took him about 12 hours to agree to it. 94 00:06:32,080 --> 00:06:35,120 And he was surprised and completely delighted 95 00:06:35,120 --> 00:06:38,240 and it became this wonderful journey that we went on together. 96 00:07:26,200 --> 00:07:29,080 TIM: David, the exhibition seems set up as a kind of journey 97 00:07:29,080 --> 00:07:32,040 through your engagement with landscape painting. 98 00:07:32,040 --> 00:07:34,760 Do you remember the circumstances in which you painted 99 00:07:34,760 --> 00:07:37,680 those two very early ones in Bradford? 100 00:07:37,680 --> 00:07:40,880 A little bit. Erm... 101 00:07:40,880 --> 00:07:45,600 One reason that I pointed out, they're the darkest paintings in here 102 00:07:45,600 --> 00:07:48,640 because they were done with cheap paint, 103 00:07:48,640 --> 00:07:51,960 a very cheap flake white, and it goes dark. 104 00:07:51,960 --> 00:07:55,120 I was at the arts school in Bradford 105 00:07:55,120 --> 00:07:58,480 and they were painting out en plein air. 106 00:07:58,480 --> 00:08:02,040 I did paint a few pictures of Bradford's streets. 107 00:08:02,040 --> 00:08:07,040 But in those days, you were always kind of trying 108 00:08:07,040 --> 00:08:10,720 to avoid LS Lowry a bit, a little bit. 109 00:08:10,720 --> 00:08:12,840 They seem quite oppressive. 110 00:08:12,840 --> 00:08:15,680 I'm fascinated by the fact it's to do with the cheap paint. 111 00:08:15,680 --> 00:08:18,760 But did you feel, at that stage, that Yorkshire and West Yorkshire 112 00:08:18,760 --> 00:08:21,440 and Bradford were quite gloomy places? 113 00:08:21,440 --> 00:08:23,520 Well, I did think that, yes. 114 00:08:23,520 --> 00:08:28,640 I mean, I've pointed out, you know, I love the cinema 115 00:08:28,640 --> 00:08:31,600 and I've always noticed 116 00:08:31,600 --> 00:08:35,120 the strong shadows in California in films, 117 00:08:35,120 --> 00:08:40,280 and you don't get those in Bradford. And, er, yeah, I mean, 118 00:08:40,280 --> 00:08:42,840 I knew there was a big wide world somewhere else 119 00:08:42,840 --> 00:08:46,720 and frankly, I was gonna go there and look at it, yeah, I was. 120 00:08:46,720 --> 00:08:49,600 So you travelled, and again, in the exhibition, 121 00:08:49,600 --> 00:08:53,200 we see the earliest results of your travels. 122 00:08:53,200 --> 00:08:56,560 There's an extraordinary painting which is called The Flight to Italy, 123 00:08:56,560 --> 00:08:59,320 but it's also subtitled a Swiss Landscape. 124 00:08:59,320 --> 00:09:01,640 What was that? Was that your Grand Tour? 125 00:09:01,640 --> 00:09:04,080 Well, it was, er, 126 00:09:04,080 --> 00:09:08,040 I think, only the second time I'd been on the Continent, 127 00:09:08,040 --> 00:09:12,800 and someone offered me and my American friend 128 00:09:12,800 --> 00:09:17,880 a lift to Bern in Switzerland in the back of a minivan. 129 00:09:17,880 --> 00:09:21,560 Well, if you haven't much money, you take this, of course, and don't mind. 130 00:09:21,560 --> 00:09:24,160 But, of course, I couldn't see anything. 131 00:09:24,160 --> 00:09:26,240 And I thought it was quite amusing, 132 00:09:26,240 --> 00:09:29,480 you know, driving through very spectacular Alps, 133 00:09:29,480 --> 00:09:32,600 and I didn't really see them for the first time, 134 00:09:32,600 --> 00:09:35,520 but you could make a painting of it somehow. 135 00:09:35,520 --> 00:09:39,320 The style of that painting is... In some ways, it's highly original, 136 00:09:39,320 --> 00:09:42,720 and in other ways, one can refer to what was happening in British 137 00:09:42,720 --> 00:09:45,160 and international art at the beginning of the '60s. 138 00:09:45,160 --> 00:09:47,280 I think Marco Livingstone, in the catalogue, 139 00:09:47,280 --> 00:09:50,280 says there's a nice nod to Harold Cohen in the abstract lines. 140 00:09:50,280 --> 00:09:52,640 Yeah. I mean, remember, this was a time 141 00:09:52,640 --> 00:09:56,600 when abstract painting was dominant, very, very dominant, 142 00:09:56,600 --> 00:10:00,080 and any kind of representational painting 143 00:10:00,080 --> 00:10:03,400 was seen as a little bit reactionary or something. 144 00:10:03,400 --> 00:10:05,480 But, I mean, I always thought 145 00:10:05,480 --> 00:10:07,880 that was a bit of a mad view of things, I did, 146 00:10:07,880 --> 00:10:12,400 erm, so you slightly could mock it a little bit. 147 00:10:12,400 --> 00:10:14,560 Was landscape a taboo subject? 148 00:10:14,560 --> 00:10:17,000 Were you conscious of it being a taboo subject then? 149 00:10:17,000 --> 00:10:20,840 Er, yes, it was, when I look back. 150 00:10:20,840 --> 00:10:24,640 And in a way, I didn't have too much interest in it 151 00:10:24,640 --> 00:10:27,120 until I went, in a way, perhaps, to Egypt. 152 00:10:27,120 --> 00:10:31,240 When I went to Egypt, which was 1963, 153 00:10:31,240 --> 00:10:35,640 was the first place I'd been ever and I just drew it. 154 00:10:35,640 --> 00:10:39,960 I didn't take a camera or anything. I just took pencil and paper. 155 00:10:39,960 --> 00:10:42,840 And then not long afterwards, I went to California, 156 00:10:42,840 --> 00:10:46,240 where, also, I reacted to the place I was. 157 00:10:46,240 --> 00:10:49,120 I actually began painting Los Angeles. 158 00:10:49,120 --> 00:10:51,480 I had never really painted London. 159 00:10:51,480 --> 00:10:54,000 I mean, I do react to the places. 160 00:10:54,000 --> 00:10:58,400 I mean, I react to the spaces I'm in as well. I do. 161 00:10:58,400 --> 00:11:02,000 From then on - that was the '60s - I keep going back to landscape. 162 00:11:02,000 --> 00:11:04,720 I keep going back to portraits as well. 163 00:11:40,840 --> 00:11:44,200 My mother died in 1999. 164 00:11:44,200 --> 00:11:48,960 She was 99, and I began to... 165 00:11:48,960 --> 00:11:53,320 Then my sister was in the hospital, so I kept staying. 166 00:11:53,320 --> 00:11:56,640 And then...I'd go back to LA, 167 00:11:56,640 --> 00:12:00,360 but then a friend of mine died in LA 168 00:12:00,360 --> 00:12:06,000 that was someone very, very close. I spent most of my evenings with him. 169 00:12:06,000 --> 00:12:09,520 And I just suddenly thought, "Well, I'll go back to England for a while. 170 00:12:09,520 --> 00:12:13,160 I don't know what to do here." And I did. 171 00:12:13,160 --> 00:12:16,960 And I went up to Yorkshire just to be quiet... 172 00:12:16,960 --> 00:12:21,440 Thinking it'd be quieter staying with my sister. 173 00:12:21,440 --> 00:12:24,400 And then I simply began to drive around, 174 00:12:24,400 --> 00:12:29,720 looking at the landscape, and realised it's very special, the landscapes. Lovely, actually. 175 00:12:29,720 --> 00:12:31,920 And I began by just... 176 00:12:31,920 --> 00:12:35,000 I thought, "Well, maybe I'll just go out and sit and... 177 00:12:35,000 --> 00:12:38,280 sit and look at it and find a way to make marks, 178 00:12:38,280 --> 00:12:41,840 make a language, find a language for it." 179 00:12:41,840 --> 00:12:44,520 And when you're taking things outside, to paint outside, 180 00:12:44,520 --> 00:12:47,640 then you start having problems if they get bigger. 181 00:12:47,640 --> 00:12:50,040 Wind, rain, things, you know. 182 00:12:50,040 --> 00:12:53,040 And the landscapes seemed big to me 183 00:12:53,040 --> 00:12:56,840 and so I wanted to make them bigger still. 184 00:12:56,840 --> 00:12:59,760 And the reason we devised this method was 185 00:12:59,760 --> 00:13:02,080 it was the only method... 186 00:13:02,080 --> 00:13:04,960 There was a limit to the size of the canvas 187 00:13:04,960 --> 00:13:09,400 I could get in the studio in Bridlington because of the stairs. 188 00:13:09,400 --> 00:13:12,880 So, you know, if you didn't want to re-stretch, there's a limit. 189 00:13:12,880 --> 00:13:15,880 So I thought, "Well, if you just put two or three together, 190 00:13:15,880 --> 00:13:18,640 you've got a bigger canvas, so you can do it like that." 191 00:13:18,640 --> 00:13:20,960 You have to keep a lot in your head, of course. 192 00:13:20,960 --> 00:13:23,040 I mean, it was... 193 00:13:23,040 --> 00:13:26,000 But it was an exciting thing to be doing, I thought. 194 00:13:26,000 --> 00:13:30,640 Then I did move into a very large studio in Bridlington. 195 00:13:30,640 --> 00:13:35,200 We were...We were actually just looking for a storage space at first 196 00:13:35,200 --> 00:13:39,080 but we found a place, I mean, five minutes from the house 197 00:13:39,080 --> 00:13:43,040 that was marvellously enormous, I mean, really big, 198 00:13:43,040 --> 00:13:47,120 and I realised there's this marvellous even light over this massive room. 199 00:13:47,120 --> 00:13:50,040 Do you try, almost always, to paint using daylight, 200 00:13:50,040 --> 00:13:52,640 so you're replicating the experience of being outside? 201 00:13:52,640 --> 00:13:54,840 I do. I mean, I prefer the daylight. 202 00:13:54,840 --> 00:13:58,040 I'm a day person, me. I'm not a night person. 203 00:13:58,040 --> 00:14:02,440 I go to bed quite early. I get up early cos I like the light. 204 00:14:02,440 --> 00:14:07,440 And in May and June in Britain, I'll be up at 6:00 205 00:14:07,440 --> 00:14:11,480 because the light is superb then because you're on the east coast. 206 00:14:11,480 --> 00:14:15,880 Most people will never see the wolds lit wonderfully, 207 00:14:15,880 --> 00:14:20,400 and the best time is, say, May and June about 6:00 in the morning. 208 00:14:20,400 --> 00:14:23,560 What are the fundamental differences between oil paintings 209 00:14:23,560 --> 00:14:26,200 that you realise in the studio 210 00:14:26,200 --> 00:14:28,920 and the watercolours and oil paintings that you realise 211 00:14:28,920 --> 00:14:31,000 en plein air in situ? 212 00:14:31,000 --> 00:14:34,360 Well, I mean, the ones en plein air 213 00:14:34,360 --> 00:14:38,400 are based on you observing and reacting to, 214 00:14:38,400 --> 00:14:40,840 basically, what's in front of you. 215 00:14:40,840 --> 00:14:43,960 I said I felt I needed to do that for a while, 216 00:14:43,960 --> 00:14:47,040 to look hard, to look hard at it 217 00:14:47,040 --> 00:14:51,160 and devise methods for dealing with it, 218 00:14:51,160 --> 00:14:53,320 mark-making and so on. 219 00:14:53,320 --> 00:14:55,480 Whereas in the big studio, 220 00:14:55,480 --> 00:15:00,480 I mean, you start then using different aspects of this. 221 00:15:00,480 --> 00:15:02,840 I would use memory, for instance. 222 00:15:02,840 --> 00:15:07,240 Once I got in the big studio and I was planning bigger pictures, 223 00:15:07,240 --> 00:15:14,120 I would often go out with a chair and pick places and sit and look. 224 00:15:14,120 --> 00:15:17,120 And knowing you're going back to work 225 00:15:17,120 --> 00:15:21,200 from the memory you are dealing with now, 226 00:15:21,200 --> 00:15:24,560 then start asking questions. 227 00:15:24,560 --> 00:15:26,640 "What do I see first? 228 00:15:26,640 --> 00:15:29,600 Does the bark of the tree dominate to me? 229 00:15:29,600 --> 00:15:32,240 Does that attract my eye? Does...?" 230 00:15:32,240 --> 00:15:34,560 Because there's so much to look at, really. 231 00:15:34,560 --> 00:15:37,440 I mean, I think it's Bonheur said 232 00:15:37,440 --> 00:15:40,440 he couldn't paint outside because it was too confusing. 233 00:15:40,440 --> 00:15:44,360 I mean, I know what he means in a way. There is... You have to edit it. 234 00:15:44,360 --> 00:15:47,320 Visual distraction everywhere. Yeah, painting is editing. 235 00:15:47,320 --> 00:15:51,480 And there came a time when, in a way, I virtually stopped 236 00:15:51,480 --> 00:15:55,080 going out to draw and paint, then, and I was doing it in the studio. 237 00:16:22,400 --> 00:16:25,760 Does this work...? Does the oil painting 238 00:16:25,760 --> 00:16:27,840 feel like the culmination, 239 00:16:27,840 --> 00:16:30,760 or is it just as much a part of the process... 240 00:16:30,760 --> 00:16:33,200 as part of the work as the individual prints are? 241 00:16:33,200 --> 00:16:37,720 Well, I mean, I think the prints actually influence this painting. 242 00:16:37,720 --> 00:16:41,400 Meaning the marks, now, are a bit different 243 00:16:41,400 --> 00:16:43,720 because the iPad has intervened. 244 00:16:43,720 --> 00:16:48,200 So the marks being made here I began to use in there. 245 00:16:48,200 --> 00:16:51,680 But the marks are very visible in these, 246 00:16:51,680 --> 00:16:54,000 meaning it's like painting. 247 00:16:54,000 --> 00:16:58,400 I'm deliberately... aware to leave the marks behind. 248 00:16:58,400 --> 00:17:02,120 And I'd always, then, planned a very big painting, 249 00:17:02,120 --> 00:17:04,680 and this is big enough for the wall. 250 00:17:04,680 --> 00:17:07,520 So in a way, you could say this work is site-specific. 251 00:17:07,520 --> 00:17:10,480 Oh, this... It's site-specific to the landscape, 252 00:17:10,480 --> 00:17:12,880 but it's specific also, in your mind, to this space. 253 00:17:12,880 --> 00:17:17,080 Yeah, this was made for this room. 254 00:17:35,040 --> 00:17:39,040 If you want to depict something that's an action in nature, 255 00:17:39,040 --> 00:17:41,360 which spring is... 256 00:17:41,360 --> 00:17:43,680 Though winter isn't necessarily an action. 257 00:17:43,680 --> 00:17:48,080 Winter is there for two months. It doesn't change much. 258 00:17:48,080 --> 00:17:50,720 Spring and autumn are actions, in a way, 259 00:17:50,720 --> 00:17:53,640 that events happen and it changes things. 260 00:17:53,640 --> 00:17:57,000 So, I became aware I wanted to deal with this. 261 00:17:57,000 --> 00:18:00,440 So, when the Royal Academy asked me, for instance... 262 00:18:00,440 --> 00:18:03,680 I think they first suggested 263 00:18:03,680 --> 00:18:08,200 the exhibition would be in January 2011. 264 00:18:08,200 --> 00:18:11,000 And I thought about it and I suggested, 265 00:18:11,000 --> 00:18:14,400 "No, January 2012 would be better," 266 00:18:14,400 --> 00:18:18,600 because I need so many springs. I think four, I said. 267 00:18:18,600 --> 00:18:22,520 And I wished to observe them more carefully 268 00:18:22,520 --> 00:18:25,000 to deal with how to do one, you see. 269 00:18:25,000 --> 00:18:27,400 Did you see that always, from the beginning, 270 00:18:27,400 --> 00:18:29,480 as a single work, a single installation? 271 00:18:29,480 --> 00:18:32,480 Not quite from the beginning, but soon after. 272 00:18:32,480 --> 00:18:34,640 The thing was they had some snow. 273 00:18:34,640 --> 00:18:39,520 So, I go out to draw the snow in the car and on an iPad, 274 00:18:39,520 --> 00:18:41,880 because I'm just in the car. 275 00:18:41,880 --> 00:18:45,440 And I did two or three, the first two or three, 276 00:18:45,440 --> 00:18:48,840 and we printed them outside and I pinned them up 277 00:18:48,840 --> 00:18:51,920 and then I kept looking and thinking, 278 00:18:51,920 --> 00:18:54,800 "Oh, my God, you could use an iPad. You could do it. 279 00:18:54,800 --> 00:18:56,880 It's a very good technique. 280 00:18:56,880 --> 00:19:01,560 I could develop these techniques to show the changes in the road." 281 00:19:01,560 --> 00:19:06,480 So it was only about mid-January, about one year ago now 282 00:19:06,480 --> 00:19:09,920 that I then realised, "Yes, the whole room could be this." 283 00:19:09,920 --> 00:19:12,760 I worked out how many approximately 284 00:19:12,760 --> 00:19:15,160 and then realised, "Well, if I begin now..." 285 00:19:15,160 --> 00:19:19,320 Originally, I was going to begin in April, when the activity really begins, 286 00:19:19,320 --> 00:19:22,120 but then I realised, put the winter there first, 287 00:19:22,120 --> 00:19:25,720 so you understand how big the change is. 288 00:19:25,720 --> 00:19:30,240 And because it's gradual, you know, most people don't notice. 289 00:19:30,240 --> 00:19:33,440 You have to be looking carefully to follow it. 290 00:19:33,440 --> 00:19:36,800 It's a very good job to observe the arrival of spring. 291 00:19:36,800 --> 00:19:40,880 Most people don't have it as a job, do they, professionally? 292 00:19:40,880 --> 00:19:43,880 But if you do, it's a very, 293 00:19:43,880 --> 00:19:46,720 very wonderful experience actually doing it. 294 00:19:46,720 --> 00:19:48,800 What does an iPad give you 295 00:19:48,800 --> 00:19:51,960 that working, say, in watercolour or using a sketchbook doesn't? 296 00:19:51,960 --> 00:19:55,800 Well, it's a new medium, so there's gains and losses. 297 00:19:55,800 --> 00:20:01,160 It is a new medium, but the great gain is speed. 298 00:20:01,160 --> 00:20:06,240 You've got all the colour, textures, all there in your hands. 299 00:20:06,240 --> 00:20:12,640 So, any draughtsman is interested in speed. It means speed of drawing. 300 00:20:12,640 --> 00:20:15,560 Sometimes drawing fast, you draw... 301 00:20:15,560 --> 00:20:18,720 You're aware that Rembrandt drew fast. 302 00:20:18,720 --> 00:20:21,120 And you're aware that often, drawing fast, 303 00:20:21,120 --> 00:20:25,080 you might sacrifice accuracy but you gain something else. 304 00:20:25,080 --> 00:20:27,360 What you miss... What do you miss? 305 00:20:27,360 --> 00:20:31,760 You miss resistance which paper has. 306 00:20:31,760 --> 00:20:35,200 Here, it is incredibly smooth. 307 00:20:35,200 --> 00:20:37,640 In a way, you're drawing on glass, I suppose, 308 00:20:37,640 --> 00:20:41,480 but the range of marks you can make is enormous. 309 00:20:41,480 --> 00:20:46,760 But I had become aware that I'd done, maybe, 300 drawings 310 00:20:46,760 --> 00:20:52,080 but you could only see them one by one on an iPad. 311 00:20:52,080 --> 00:20:54,760 And then I realised to see them all, 312 00:20:54,760 --> 00:20:57,480 you've got to just have a traditional exhibition. 313 00:20:57,480 --> 00:21:00,400 How will you see 30 and compare them? 314 00:21:00,400 --> 00:21:02,880 I thought that was amusing, you know. 315 00:21:02,880 --> 00:21:05,920 I thought, "Well, yes, how do you exhibit these things?" 316 00:21:05,920 --> 00:21:11,600 Hockney's Yorkshire landscapes are very varied, I think. 317 00:21:11,600 --> 00:21:14,880 They're varied in quality, 318 00:21:14,880 --> 00:21:18,280 they're varied in what they're trying to do. 319 00:21:18,280 --> 00:21:21,720 It was, kind of, an experiment in making art. 320 00:21:21,720 --> 00:21:24,920 I mean, it was a strange and brave thing for Hockney, 321 00:21:24,920 --> 00:21:28,560 who had made his home so successfully in the United States, 322 00:21:28,560 --> 00:21:30,640 to return to Yorkshire, 323 00:21:30,640 --> 00:21:33,240 to return to the landscapes of his youth. 324 00:21:33,240 --> 00:21:37,040 John Constable said that he painted the landscapes of his youth. 325 00:21:37,040 --> 00:21:40,200 Hockney's made a life not of painting the landscapes of his youth 326 00:21:40,200 --> 00:21:43,480 but painting other landscapes, other places. 327 00:21:43,480 --> 00:21:47,400 He goes back to Yorkshire and also goes back 328 00:21:47,400 --> 00:21:50,680 to a Impressionist, 19th-century way of painting. 329 00:21:50,680 --> 00:21:53,600 The way that Constable painted, the way that Monet painted - 330 00:21:53,600 --> 00:21:55,960 in other words, standing in the open air, 331 00:21:55,960 --> 00:22:00,760 trying to paint the motif in nature directly from observation. 332 00:22:00,760 --> 00:22:03,240 And the exhibition that eventually resulted, 333 00:22:03,240 --> 00:22:05,560 this huge exhibition at the Royal Academy, 334 00:22:05,560 --> 00:22:07,520 it was a fascinating exhibition 335 00:22:07,520 --> 00:22:11,560 in which David Hockney explored the idea 336 00:22:11,560 --> 00:22:15,800 that you can still paint nature and paint from nature 337 00:22:15,800 --> 00:22:19,120 and paint landscapes in the way that Monet painted them 338 00:22:19,120 --> 00:22:22,520 or Constable painted them, that you can still do that today 339 00:22:22,520 --> 00:22:28,040 and it'd still be an important and moving art. 340 00:22:28,040 --> 00:22:32,160 I think it was a partial success in those terms. 341 00:22:32,160 --> 00:22:37,200 But it was a total success as a experiment 342 00:22:37,200 --> 00:22:41,680 and as an example of an artist who doesn't rest on his laurels. 343 00:23:50,880 --> 00:23:54,560 After finishing his immersion in his native Yorkshire landscape, 344 00:23:54,560 --> 00:23:58,080 Hockney returned to Los Angeles in 2012, 345 00:23:58,080 --> 00:24:01,720 and for a time, he wasn't sure what it was he wanted to paint. 346 00:24:01,720 --> 00:24:04,720 But eventually he turned his attentions to another genre, 347 00:24:04,720 --> 00:24:06,840 that of portraiture. 348 00:24:06,840 --> 00:24:10,400 And four years later, another extraordinary exhibition at the Royal Academy 349 00:24:10,400 --> 00:24:13,360 of 82 portraits and a still life, 350 00:24:13,360 --> 00:24:16,120 all in the same format, four by three, 351 00:24:16,120 --> 00:24:18,200 with each of the sitters, 352 00:24:18,200 --> 00:24:22,360 be they friends, artists, people who were visiting the studio, 353 00:24:22,360 --> 00:24:26,800 painted over a period of three days, 22 hours. 354 00:24:26,800 --> 00:24:28,880 When the time had elapsed, that was it. 355 00:24:28,880 --> 00:24:31,040 Hockney finished, took a couple of days' break 356 00:24:31,040 --> 00:24:33,360 and then started again. 357 00:24:33,360 --> 00:24:36,760 And in a way, each of the works bears scrutiny, 358 00:24:36,760 --> 00:24:41,360 but actually, it's one single work of art, ultimately. 359 00:25:37,400 --> 00:25:40,720 EDITH: The landscape show was one of the biggest things he's ever done. 360 00:25:40,720 --> 00:25:43,240 Even he says that across his career 361 00:25:43,240 --> 00:25:46,080 it was the biggest challenge he was ever set 362 00:25:46,080 --> 00:25:49,880 by an institution before, to create that volume of work. 363 00:25:49,880 --> 00:25:54,760 And what's interesting for us is having, I guess, exhausted 364 00:25:54,760 --> 00:25:57,480 the idea of looking at the landscape 365 00:25:57,480 --> 00:26:00,280 and challenging our perception of the landscape, 366 00:26:00,280 --> 00:26:05,080 he goes from that great expanse to the intimacy of the portrait. 367 00:26:05,080 --> 00:26:07,680 He'd got used to sending me images 368 00:26:07,680 --> 00:26:10,040 of all the works that he was creating, 369 00:26:10,040 --> 00:26:13,320 so we kept in touch that way on a very, very regular basis. 370 00:26:13,320 --> 00:26:17,320 After a while, this incredible portrait came through 371 00:26:17,320 --> 00:26:19,320 of Jean-Pierre with his head in his hands, 372 00:26:19,320 --> 00:26:21,400 and David's subject was, 373 00:26:21,400 --> 00:26:24,800 "This is a portrait of Jean-Pierre but it could be a self-portrait." 374 00:26:24,800 --> 00:26:27,400 And it was just an enormously, kind of, poignant... 375 00:26:27,400 --> 00:26:31,040 And we could see the link to Van Gogh's Old Man In Sorrow, 376 00:26:31,040 --> 00:26:34,320 and it was just such a remarkable work. 377 00:26:34,320 --> 00:26:39,280 And then, slowly but becoming increasingly regular, 378 00:26:39,280 --> 00:26:41,400 other portraits emerged. 379 00:27:01,720 --> 00:27:07,480 DAVID: Painted portraits are different from photographed portraits. 380 00:27:07,480 --> 00:27:12,000 These are painted portraits. I just paint them. 381 00:27:12,000 --> 00:27:17,040 It took me a little while to get into it, 382 00:27:17,040 --> 00:27:20,160 er, because... 383 00:27:20,160 --> 00:27:23,640 I did some portraits first, 384 00:27:23,640 --> 00:27:27,160 just having somebody sit. 385 00:27:27,160 --> 00:27:31,960 I did two or three and then I thought about it 386 00:27:31,960 --> 00:27:37,000 and I thought, "Well, I need the feet in, I think." 387 00:27:37,000 --> 00:27:41,600 So in the end, I got them on a platform. 388 00:27:41,600 --> 00:27:44,520 And I did the first one 389 00:27:44,520 --> 00:27:49,080 and the feet just came off the bottom. 390 00:27:49,080 --> 00:27:53,680 And so, I did another one with Gregory 391 00:27:53,680 --> 00:27:57,920 and put the feet in, but the chair was wrong then. 392 00:27:57,920 --> 00:28:02,920 That chair...at the side, you wouldn't see the figure in it. 393 00:28:02,920 --> 00:28:09,640 And so I quickly got to a simpler chair. 394 00:28:09,640 --> 00:28:15,600 I did about five or six portraits 395 00:28:15,600 --> 00:28:17,720 quite quickly. 396 00:28:17,720 --> 00:28:21,000 I mean, each one took three days. 397 00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:23,080 And I'd realised 398 00:28:23,080 --> 00:28:28,600 if you ask somebody to sit for a portrait, which I did, 399 00:28:28,600 --> 00:28:31,240 how long can they sit there? 400 00:28:31,240 --> 00:28:34,440 I mean... And I thought, 401 00:28:34,440 --> 00:28:40,880 "Well, three days. I could ask people to give me three days, 402 00:28:40,880 --> 00:28:44,480 and a portrait would be made in three days." 403 00:28:44,480 --> 00:28:47,760 I'm painting all the time 404 00:28:47,760 --> 00:28:52,720 and the third day is slower. 405 00:28:52,720 --> 00:28:55,800 The quickest painting is when you start. 406 00:28:55,800 --> 00:29:00,040 But when you're finishing, the third day, 407 00:29:00,040 --> 00:29:05,800 I'm... You know, you're just putting on a few marks, a few strokes, 408 00:29:05,800 --> 00:29:09,040 and so it's slower, 409 00:29:09,040 --> 00:29:11,840 what you're doing, and deciding what you do. 410 00:29:11,840 --> 00:29:15,720 But I have done them in three days. 411 00:29:15,720 --> 00:29:21,320 I mean, I think you can paint a portrait in three days. 412 00:29:21,320 --> 00:29:24,160 I mean, you can paint a portrait in an hour, actually. 413 00:29:24,160 --> 00:29:31,160 I'd got it going by about the sixth one or something, 414 00:29:31,160 --> 00:29:36,640 and I decided on just a plain background, 415 00:29:36,640 --> 00:29:39,120 blue or green, 416 00:29:39,120 --> 00:29:44,440 and I was going to concentrate on the figure then, just the figure. 417 00:29:44,440 --> 00:29:47,200 When he got to about 20 or 30, 418 00:29:47,200 --> 00:29:49,880 I called him and said, "Can I come and see you?" 419 00:29:49,880 --> 00:29:52,640 And that's when I suggested that we could do 420 00:29:52,640 --> 00:29:57,040 a very contained exhibition if he was able to fill this space, 421 00:29:57,040 --> 00:30:00,560 which, of course... He loves that sort of challenge. 422 00:30:00,560 --> 00:30:03,760 And I knew, from working with him on the landscape exhibition, 423 00:30:03,760 --> 00:30:05,760 that he relishes that. 424 00:30:05,760 --> 00:30:09,600 This is Margaret, your older sister. 425 00:30:09,600 --> 00:30:14,200 Yes, and she came with Pauline. 426 00:30:14,200 --> 00:30:18,120 I think she's comfortable with me. 427 00:30:18,120 --> 00:30:21,480 You see, she's comfortable, she's sat before. 428 00:30:21,480 --> 00:30:23,560 She's sat many times, hasn't she? 429 00:30:23,560 --> 00:30:27,680 Yes, and so she's comfortable with me, 430 00:30:27,680 --> 00:30:29,760 whereas Pauline wasn't quite. 431 00:30:29,760 --> 00:30:33,600 They're just drawn and painted. 432 00:30:33,600 --> 00:30:36,960 And I draw it out 433 00:30:36,960 --> 00:30:41,160 in about 45 minutes, I think. 434 00:30:41,160 --> 00:30:45,280 Charcoal straight onto the canvas. Charcoal straight onto the canvas. 435 00:30:45,280 --> 00:30:50,440 And then I start painting, putting in the background and things 436 00:30:50,440 --> 00:30:54,880 and that's all I'm doing. But she's very much at ease, isn't she? 437 00:30:54,880 --> 00:30:57,680 Yeah, she is. She's sitting at ease. 438 00:30:57,680 --> 00:31:00,520 She knows what to expect, she's done it so many times before. 439 00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:05,880 Yeah. And she's looking at me. Yes. Absolutely looking at me. Yeah. 440 00:31:05,880 --> 00:31:08,520 Once the eyes are in there like that, 441 00:31:08,520 --> 00:31:12,560 I wouldn't touch them, yeah. 442 00:31:12,560 --> 00:31:17,240 What you can do now is demystify how David Hockney creates a drawing, 443 00:31:17,240 --> 00:31:19,720 and it is absolutely fascinating to watch it. 444 00:31:19,720 --> 00:31:22,280 His hands just are fluid, and the lines, 445 00:31:22,280 --> 00:31:25,160 and you can see those pauses when he's looking up 446 00:31:25,160 --> 00:31:28,240 and he's working out his perspective. 447 00:31:28,240 --> 00:31:30,320 But there's a moment at which there's... 448 00:31:30,320 --> 00:31:32,760 I can only call it a kind of magic comes into play, 449 00:31:32,760 --> 00:31:35,800 and you think, "No, he's got it now, and I'm still not quite sure... 450 00:31:35,800 --> 00:31:38,120 I've been watching it but I'm still not quite sure 451 00:31:38,120 --> 00:31:40,120 how he's achieved it." 452 00:31:40,120 --> 00:31:43,080 I mean, to see yourself painted, 453 00:31:43,080 --> 00:31:46,560 to see the finished product, is a very strange thing 454 00:31:46,560 --> 00:31:49,680 because it wasn't me as I understood myself to look. 455 00:31:49,680 --> 00:31:51,720 So it's not like looking in the mirror. 456 00:31:51,720 --> 00:31:55,840 You're sitting there for three days. You can't hold an expression, 457 00:31:55,840 --> 00:31:59,400 so your expression has to be one that's quite neutral. 458 00:31:59,400 --> 00:32:02,640 So it's not one that you often see yourself. 459 00:32:02,640 --> 00:32:06,520 And the one that's in the exhibition is actually the second portrait he did of me. 460 00:32:06,520 --> 00:32:10,360 And when I was leaving... After having that done, I stayed with him for a few days, 461 00:32:10,360 --> 00:32:13,000 and he said to me, "You're happy with it, aren't you?" 462 00:32:13,000 --> 00:32:15,360 And I said, "David, I love it. It's fantastic." 463 00:32:15,360 --> 00:32:17,320 And I said, "Do you think you got me?" 464 00:32:17,320 --> 00:32:20,360 And he said, "Well, I've got an aspect of you." 465 00:32:22,000 --> 00:32:25,680 The fact that none of these are commissions is a very important thing, 466 00:32:25,680 --> 00:32:28,800 because we all went with no expectations. 467 00:32:28,800 --> 00:32:31,800 We weren't paying for it, so we had no expectations. 468 00:32:31,800 --> 00:32:34,760 So we weren't able to say, "Can you make me look more youthful?" 469 00:32:34,760 --> 00:32:37,720 or, "Can you make sure that you square up my shoulders?" 470 00:32:37,720 --> 00:32:40,960 There was none of that, which gave him absolute freedom 471 00:32:40,960 --> 00:32:45,350 and was a very important aspect of the series. 472 00:32:55,310 --> 00:32:58,190 This still life is quite early in the series 473 00:32:58,190 --> 00:33:00,790 and when David sent it through to me, 474 00:33:00,790 --> 00:33:03,150 I saw it first on my iPhone and thought, 475 00:33:03,150 --> 00:33:06,310 "Ah, well, that's just glorious. It's just gorgeous." 476 00:33:06,310 --> 00:33:09,190 And when I went to LA, then, and looked at the still life 477 00:33:09,190 --> 00:33:12,150 and talked about having a portrait exhibition, 478 00:33:12,150 --> 00:33:16,270 I said, "Couldn't we just put that in? It's a kind of a portrait, too, isn't it?" 479 00:33:16,270 --> 00:33:18,830 And so, we always joked about including it 480 00:33:18,830 --> 00:33:21,230 and in the end, we did. We decided to, 481 00:33:21,230 --> 00:33:23,590 and David came up with the title 82 Portraits... 482 00:33:23,590 --> 00:33:25,710 It was changing all the time. 483 00:33:25,710 --> 00:33:28,630 It started off as '70-something Portraits' and kept going up, 484 00:33:28,630 --> 00:33:31,190 but it remained '..and 1 Still-life'. 485 00:34:14,270 --> 00:34:17,270 David, this is the first time you've shown at the Royal Academy 486 00:34:17,270 --> 00:34:19,350 since 2012. 487 00:34:19,350 --> 00:34:23,910 600,000 people visited it, that exhibition, here at the Academy. 488 00:34:23,910 --> 00:34:26,830 1.2 million in total. 489 00:34:26,830 --> 00:34:29,670 And then four years later, 490 00:34:29,670 --> 00:34:33,910 here we are with a new series, portraiture. 491 00:34:33,910 --> 00:34:40,190 Is this a more intimate reaction to the sublime space of landscape 492 00:34:40,190 --> 00:34:43,750 that made you want to turn your attention to the human figure again? 493 00:34:43,750 --> 00:34:46,510 Well, I mean, when I began, 494 00:34:46,510 --> 00:34:49,990 of course, I didn't plan it like this. 495 00:34:49,990 --> 00:34:54,190 I mean, I just began with that picture of JP. 496 00:34:54,190 --> 00:34:56,510 JP like this. 497 00:34:56,510 --> 00:35:01,990 Even then, I mean, there was a month before I did anything else. 498 00:35:01,990 --> 00:35:05,550 You'd been ill and a friend of yours had died in tragic circumstances. 499 00:35:05,550 --> 00:35:09,790 Yeah. Well, we went back to California 500 00:35:09,790 --> 00:35:13,630 because we were going to do a show in San Francisco 501 00:35:13,630 --> 00:35:18,790 and we'd got back and Bridlington went with us. 502 00:35:18,790 --> 00:35:21,430 We were very down. 503 00:35:21,430 --> 00:35:26,030 I just began drawing in the garden a bit. 504 00:35:26,030 --> 00:35:32,550 I mean, it was about a month later and JP was sitting there like this 505 00:35:32,550 --> 00:35:37,470 and I suddenly thought, "I'll paint. I'll paint." 506 00:35:38,990 --> 00:35:41,830 Is there a sense... Redemption is perhaps 507 00:35:41,830 --> 00:35:45,030 too broad an idea, but if you started off 508 00:35:45,030 --> 00:35:47,870 with you and one of your closest friends 509 00:35:47,870 --> 00:35:51,070 feeling so down about the world, there does seem a lightness. 510 00:35:51,070 --> 00:35:53,550 So you could almost see it as a journey into light. 511 00:35:53,550 --> 00:35:56,950 Is that too simple? Well, yes, it was. 512 00:35:56,950 --> 00:36:01,070 I mean, er, I think you can see 513 00:36:01,070 --> 00:36:04,190 I get to feel better and better. 514 00:36:04,190 --> 00:36:07,950 So is painting cathartic for you? Has it always been cathartic to some extent? 515 00:36:07,950 --> 00:36:13,150 Yes, yes. I mean, I really enjoyed doing them. I did. 516 00:36:13,150 --> 00:36:15,830 Each one was quite hard. 517 00:36:15,830 --> 00:36:20,270 I mean, each one, I had to start and draw it, 518 00:36:20,270 --> 00:36:25,830 and that was quite tense, doing it. 519 00:36:25,830 --> 00:36:29,870 But I did thoroughly enjoy doing them. I did. 520 00:36:29,870 --> 00:36:32,230 A different acrylic paint at the beginning... 521 00:36:32,230 --> 00:36:35,070 You shifted the particular paint, didn't you? 522 00:36:35,070 --> 00:36:39,790 Er, yes, well, the first... Larry and Jonathan there, 523 00:36:39,790 --> 00:36:45,030 they were with Liquitex, which dries very quickly, 524 00:36:45,030 --> 00:36:50,910 and then JP found this other acrylic paint that has more gel init, 525 00:36:50,910 --> 00:36:53,230 so it dries slower 526 00:36:53,230 --> 00:36:59,630 and you can work on the faces and blend and things like that. 527 00:36:59,630 --> 00:37:04,150 And so, I think... I think this was paint made for me, 528 00:37:04,150 --> 00:37:07,270 made for my method of painting. 529 00:37:07,270 --> 00:37:11,270 And it is, and it dries overnight, of course. 530 00:37:11,270 --> 00:37:16,030 Each day, JP would photograph them, 531 00:37:16,030 --> 00:37:21,270 and he'd send me, on the iPad, the picture 532 00:37:21,270 --> 00:37:23,830 at the end of the day. 533 00:37:23,830 --> 00:37:27,910 And then I'd look at it in the bedroom 534 00:37:27,910 --> 00:37:29,990 and then the next day I'd know 535 00:37:29,990 --> 00:37:33,990 exactly how to start again, what to do. 536 00:37:33,990 --> 00:37:37,150 And so...I'm saying it's a 20-hour exposure, 537 00:37:37,150 --> 00:37:39,310 but it's actually longer 538 00:37:39,310 --> 00:37:43,350 because I did look at them, study it, 539 00:37:43,350 --> 00:37:46,590 and that's how they were done. 540 00:37:46,590 --> 00:37:48,950 I think there's a happiness to these paintings. 541 00:37:48,950 --> 00:37:54,270 He's enjoying himself. But also, he's not trying to be Lucian Freud. 542 00:37:54,270 --> 00:37:59,390 He's not trying to do traditional portraits here at all. 543 00:37:59,390 --> 00:38:02,270 If you look at them, the thing that stayed in my mind from them 544 00:38:02,270 --> 00:38:04,910 is the colours. The colours are superb. 545 00:38:04,910 --> 00:38:07,390 They're full of fizzing colour. 546 00:38:07,390 --> 00:38:10,790 And what he's really looking at is the clothes the people are wearing, 547 00:38:10,790 --> 00:38:12,910 all the bright colours that they're wearing, 548 00:38:12,910 --> 00:38:15,350 and I think he was very much thinking about Matisse 549 00:38:15,350 --> 00:38:19,110 and Matisse's art and the expressiveness of colour. 550 00:38:19,110 --> 00:38:22,430 There's actually a game going on in which he's enjoying 551 00:38:22,430 --> 00:38:26,310 and exploring the power of colour to scintillate, 552 00:38:26,310 --> 00:38:28,430 and the effect is very strong, 553 00:38:28,430 --> 00:38:31,790 that while you might go up to an individual in one of those paintings 554 00:38:31,790 --> 00:38:34,710 and say, "Oh, it doesn't look like any..." (MUMBLES) 555 00:38:34,710 --> 00:38:37,630 what you actually come away with is the colours 556 00:38:37,630 --> 00:38:39,990 and the emotional work that the colours do. 557 00:38:39,990 --> 00:38:44,670 Just as Matisse used colour to express things, 558 00:38:44,670 --> 00:38:48,630 Hockney there gives you a vibrant fizz 559 00:38:48,630 --> 00:38:52,830 of life-enhancing, redemptive, 560 00:38:52,830 --> 00:38:54,830 joyous colour. 561 00:39:34,550 --> 00:39:36,870 MARTIN: Posing for a portrait to David Hockney 562 00:39:36,870 --> 00:39:39,710 was a very different experience from posing to Lucian Freud, 563 00:39:39,710 --> 00:39:42,270 which is another experience I had 564 00:39:42,270 --> 00:39:45,350 and, actually, David Hockney had himself, 565 00:39:45,350 --> 00:39:48,310 and that difference was, I think, partly because of 566 00:39:48,310 --> 00:39:51,790 David's conception of the series, that it... 567 00:39:51,790 --> 00:39:55,470 Each picture was, as he put it, a 20-hour take. 568 00:39:55,470 --> 00:39:59,710 So he'd constricted himself, not to a very short period, 569 00:39:59,710 --> 00:40:02,230 but to a relatively short period of time. 570 00:40:02,230 --> 00:40:04,990 In contrast, a Freud portrait might take 571 00:40:04,990 --> 00:40:08,430 130, 140, 150 hours, 572 00:40:08,430 --> 00:40:10,630 so it's a lot more time. 573 00:40:10,630 --> 00:40:15,870 And so David was concentrating pretty hard 574 00:40:15,870 --> 00:40:21,350 on just the business of observing and painting while he was at work. 575 00:40:21,350 --> 00:40:25,390 Lucian would put down the brush and reminisce 576 00:40:25,390 --> 00:40:29,750 and spend a lot of time mixing up paints, chatting, 577 00:40:29,750 --> 00:40:31,830 then concentrate for a bit. 578 00:40:31,830 --> 00:40:34,910 David was concentrating absolutely 100% of the time 579 00:40:34,910 --> 00:40:38,790 during the sittings and more or less in silence. 580 00:40:38,790 --> 00:40:41,430 He would say the occasional thing - 581 00:40:41,430 --> 00:40:43,950 "You can move your foot a bit now," 582 00:40:43,950 --> 00:40:46,750 that kind of thing, but not anecdote, not conversation. 583 00:40:46,750 --> 00:40:49,790 That came afterwards, when one sat down and we relaxed on thesofa 584 00:40:49,790 --> 00:40:53,590 and he'd have a look at the picture, and then he might start chatting. 585 00:40:53,590 --> 00:40:56,590 So he was actually a rather different person 586 00:40:56,590 --> 00:40:58,670 from the social David Hockney, 587 00:40:58,670 --> 00:41:01,950 who is a great conversationalist, actually. 588 00:41:01,950 --> 00:41:07,470 The artist David Hockney was largely silent and an observer. 589 00:41:07,470 --> 00:41:12,710 What David's got is me looking very hard at what he's doing, 590 00:41:12,710 --> 00:41:15,510 how he's operating with his palette, 591 00:41:15,510 --> 00:41:18,230 what the difference is and the procedure is 592 00:41:18,230 --> 00:41:20,270 here in the Hockney studio. 593 00:41:20,270 --> 00:41:23,630 So I look rather, despite jet-lag, 594 00:41:23,630 --> 00:41:27,830 rather bright and alert in that picture. 595 00:41:27,830 --> 00:41:31,670 Every sitter you chose was known to you. Is that right? Oh, yes. 596 00:41:31,670 --> 00:41:36,110 I mean, everybody I know, everyone I know... 597 00:41:36,110 --> 00:41:38,910 And you consider this a single work of art. 598 00:41:38,910 --> 00:41:42,150 It's a continuous work of 83 paintings. 599 00:41:42,150 --> 00:41:45,430 Well, I think so, yes. I mean, I've kept them... 600 00:41:45,430 --> 00:41:47,430 I'm going to do more when I get back. 601 00:41:47,430 --> 00:41:50,150 I mean, I've done... 602 00:41:50,150 --> 00:41:54,190 Actually, I've done about 94 because we left some out. 603 00:41:54,190 --> 00:41:59,470 I painted one or two people three times, some twice. 604 00:41:59,470 --> 00:42:02,990 I only left out one person 605 00:42:02,990 --> 00:42:05,590 who had given me three days, 606 00:42:05,590 --> 00:42:09,470 but I did point out he was the only person not looking at me. 607 00:42:09,470 --> 00:42:15,030 Interesting. So, Rembrandt once said that every painting he made, 608 00:42:15,030 --> 00:42:17,150 to a certain extent, was a self-portrait. 609 00:42:17,150 --> 00:42:20,070 There is no explicit self-portrait here. 610 00:42:20,070 --> 00:42:22,670 Do you see these as extensions of the self sometimes, 611 00:42:22,670 --> 00:42:25,710 or were you quite remote or dispassionate when making them? 612 00:42:25,710 --> 00:42:30,310 Well, I did them, I painted them. 613 00:42:30,310 --> 00:42:32,910 They did get clearer. 614 00:42:32,910 --> 00:42:35,070 I mean, if you look at the first ones 615 00:42:35,070 --> 00:42:38,790 and then look at the last ones just over there, 616 00:42:38,790 --> 00:42:42,430 you can see how the colour gets stronger, 617 00:42:42,430 --> 00:42:45,070 the drawing gets stronger. 618 00:42:45,070 --> 00:42:47,470 They get more resolve because you have a facility, 619 00:42:47,470 --> 00:42:50,590 you realise what it is you're doing. It becomes easier. 620 00:42:50,590 --> 00:42:54,310 Yes, and I understand more what I'm doing. 621 00:42:54,310 --> 00:42:58,670 By the time I got to paint Little Rufus... 622 00:42:58,670 --> 00:43:00,630 he understood what I was doing. 623 00:43:00,630 --> 00:43:03,350 Well, both his parents are artists. But I wonder whether 624 00:43:03,350 --> 00:43:05,510 there came a moment where you systematically 625 00:43:05,510 --> 00:43:10,790 wanted to paint the ages of man, or mankind, from 11 to 80, 626 00:43:10,790 --> 00:43:13,830 or whether that was just in the nature of the people that you knew. 627 00:43:13,830 --> 00:43:16,510 Well, I mean, I became aware of that. 628 00:43:16,510 --> 00:43:19,470 I mean, I became aware I was painting people... 629 00:43:19,470 --> 00:43:23,790 I mean, Leon Banks was 92. 630 00:43:23,790 --> 00:43:27,830 Rita's 91. 631 00:43:27,830 --> 00:43:30,150 And then I thought, 632 00:43:30,150 --> 00:43:33,510 "Well, I'd like to do some young people as well." 633 00:43:33,510 --> 00:43:36,950 So, actually, there's all ages here. There is. 634 00:43:36,950 --> 00:43:39,830 And as they built up, 635 00:43:39,830 --> 00:43:43,950 when I'd done 40, say, 636 00:43:43,950 --> 00:43:47,310 I would then hang them up, 637 00:43:47,310 --> 00:43:51,430 even when they were just first done. 638 00:43:51,430 --> 00:43:56,390 I'd hang them up to make sure they were different from the others, 639 00:43:56,390 --> 00:44:01,830 because all their legs are different, the way they are, 640 00:44:01,830 --> 00:44:05,430 what happens with the feet and things. 641 00:44:05,430 --> 00:44:08,510 None jump out because they all jump out. 642 00:44:08,510 --> 00:44:13,270 You have to look at them all because they're all individuals. 643 00:45:00,710 --> 00:45:03,750 You seem to have as much curiosity now 644 00:45:03,750 --> 00:45:07,030 as you did ten years ago, 20 years ago, 50 years ago. 645 00:45:07,030 --> 00:45:10,470 But as you get older, do you have to try sometimes 646 00:45:10,470 --> 00:45:14,390 to step outside the artist you've become? 647 00:45:14,390 --> 00:45:16,510 Or is it just part of your natural curiosity 648 00:45:16,510 --> 00:45:20,670 to make things anew every time? Well, I am naturally curious. 649 00:45:20,670 --> 00:45:24,590 I mean, we went to China last year, 650 00:45:24,590 --> 00:45:29,670 and they were animating scrolls 651 00:45:29,670 --> 00:45:31,990 and I thought they were superb. 652 00:45:31,990 --> 00:45:35,390 I think... Well, there was thousands of scrolls. 653 00:45:35,390 --> 00:45:39,790 Well, a scroll, only one person at a time can see them, 654 00:45:39,790 --> 00:45:43,350 but now with these big screens and animation, 655 00:45:43,350 --> 00:45:46,470 I mean, they can look back at their past art 656 00:45:46,470 --> 00:45:51,190 and now do it on a whole new way. 657 00:45:51,190 --> 00:45:54,350 I think that's very exciting, actually. 658 00:45:54,350 --> 00:45:59,350 I think there's a lot you can do with painting now, a lot more. 659 00:45:59,350 --> 00:46:01,670 And you don't feel the pressure 660 00:46:01,670 --> 00:46:05,030 of public expectation when you make art? 661 00:46:05,030 --> 00:46:08,430 Oh, no. I mean, I... 662 00:46:08,430 --> 00:46:14,830 I live in LA very quietly and I just think about painting. 663 00:46:14,830 --> 00:46:19,510 I just now read and paint, really, 664 00:46:19,510 --> 00:46:22,550 cos that's all I can do, and... 665 00:46:22,550 --> 00:46:25,790 But I'm always thinking about painting 666 00:46:25,790 --> 00:46:30,550 and thinking about what to do next, yes. 667 00:46:30,550 --> 00:46:34,950 I mean, we've done a great big Taschen book. 668 00:46:34,950 --> 00:46:39,710 You know, I'm doing a... One of these big SUMO books. 669 00:46:39,710 --> 00:46:42,910 And that made me look back. 670 00:46:42,910 --> 00:46:48,710 I found lots of things from Bradford School of Art, 671 00:46:48,710 --> 00:46:53,230 er, that I had forgotten about. 672 00:46:53,230 --> 00:46:57,030 Does looking back give you ideas to go forward, 673 00:46:57,030 --> 00:47:00,070 or have you got plenty of ideas? Well, it has, actually. 674 00:47:00,070 --> 00:47:05,550 I mean, it made me see a lot more what I'd done, 675 00:47:05,550 --> 00:47:09,950 and I think, "Well, yes, that was rather good 676 00:47:09,950 --> 00:47:13,230 and I could develop that a bit more now. 677 00:47:13,230 --> 00:47:15,310 I didn't develop it enough." 678 00:47:15,310 --> 00:47:18,830 When I go back, I'm just gonna carry on. 679 00:47:18,830 --> 00:47:21,750 I mean, you gotta have something to do, don't ya? 680 00:47:21,750 --> 00:47:25,150 And I do have something to do. 681 00:47:25,150 --> 00:47:28,390 In terms of his standing in the whole history of art, 682 00:47:28,390 --> 00:47:32,030 he's done paintings that'll never be forgotten, 683 00:47:32,030 --> 00:47:34,350 paintings that defined an era. 684 00:47:34,350 --> 00:47:38,030 So, I think to have done definitive paintings of modern life 685 00:47:38,030 --> 00:47:40,470 is a great achievement. 686 00:47:40,470 --> 00:47:44,030 Whatever else he does, whatever you think of other works he may have done, 687 00:47:44,030 --> 00:47:48,750 David Hockney is an artist who will always be remembered, 688 00:47:48,750 --> 00:47:51,190 and will always be remembered as... 689 00:47:51,190 --> 00:47:54,670 in a happy way for someone who had a sense of beauty. 690 00:47:54,670 --> 00:47:59,910 I'm working more than I ever did. I mean, er... 691 00:47:59,910 --> 00:48:06,030 I'll tell you this. People tell me to stop smoking. 692 00:48:07,190 --> 00:48:10,430 I don't smoke when I paint, 693 00:48:10,430 --> 00:48:15,270 but when I stop, which I do occasionally 694 00:48:15,270 --> 00:48:18,070 to look at, to reassess what you're doing 695 00:48:18,070 --> 00:48:20,150 and when will I do it, 696 00:48:20,150 --> 00:48:23,350 that's when I have a cigarette, usually. 697 00:48:23,350 --> 00:48:25,750 And, er, 698 00:48:25,750 --> 00:48:28,830 the people who tell me to stop smoking, 699 00:48:28,830 --> 00:48:34,750 they're telling me at that moment, I should think about my body. 700 00:48:34,750 --> 00:48:37,110 Well, I don't want to think about my body. 701 00:48:37,110 --> 00:48:39,390 I want to think about the painting. 702 00:48:40,670 --> 00:48:46,590 Portraiture, landscape and still life. What else is there? 703 00:48:46,590 --> 00:48:49,790 (LAUGHS) 704 00:48:49,790 --> 00:48:54,190 You might say. I don't know. 705 00:48:54,190 --> 00:48:56,190 subtitles by Deluxe