THERE'S A NEW HOCKNEY GALLERY!
I have been so excited about this; more Hockney on my door step, yes!
This permanent gallery serves such a brilliant role in the art education of people in Bradford. Hockney is such a treasured part of Bradford's heritage but only seems present in the legacy of his paintings at Salt's Mill. The national exhibitions of Hockney I have seen before have been mainly of his famous paintings but this exhibition in his home city really reveals Hockney's changing practice across his career.
Family orientated, it does feel a little like a set, with props and things for children to engage with but it hosts some absolute gold. I'd never seen Hockney's etchings before, so these were stand out for me. Hockney's incredibly playful tone of voice carries through his work, but these etchings seem so experimental and speculative.
His iconic breadth of colour is minimised but bold reds and blues carry his concern with illustration, communicating ideas and imagery through a personal visual language.
These particular etchings don't necessarily seem concerned with scenery or linear narrative, but rather isolated objects and shape, seeming to compliment Hockney's ever sensitive tone of voice. Line quality demonstrates a fragility and delicacy appropriate to the minimalism of these drawings. Almost scientific in narrative, Hockney seems to have achieved a rather diagrammatic drawing approach, very different to his painterly landscapes.
Translation seems central to Hockney's practice as he communicates his observations through rather selective components and applies his naive aesthetic to these with such effect that seemingly meaningless objects are just so beautiful.
I want to go back...
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