News Art Blog

“[I]t was here that I found a scene that did not exist elsewhere. I suppose I was like a child in a sweet shop. The California beach was like heaven,” British painter David Hockney says in Christopher Simon Sykes’ David Hockney: A Rake’s Progress: The Biography, 1937-1975. The first volume of a proposed two-part biography, Sykes’ first volume follows Hockney—perhaps the most canonically accepted artist alive today—from his humble beginnings in Bradford huddling with his family from the “blitz” to his ascent in the art world and discovery of love and inspiration in a Californian paradise. Written with Hockney’s authorization and cooperation, but not his endorsement, David Hockney: A Rake’s Progress might be the final gesture that cements Hockney’s proper place in the art history pantheon. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "British Artist David Hockney’s CaliforniaDreaming."


[Image: David Hockney. A Bigger Splash(detail), 1967.]