David Hockney: Drawing in a Printing Machine, Annely Juda, London

Memorable images for the masses? Computer says Yes!

News in pictures
News in pictures
On Facebook
Arts & Ents blogs

Beth Jeans Houghton interview: “I hate London”

Falling from the limelight is often damaging to any artist and devastating at the start of a career....

Turbo Records going into overdrive for 2012

Last year I interviewed Tiga, owner of Canadian label Turbo Records, about his ZZT project - which h...

Review of Being Human: ‘Being Human 1955’

Following on from an episode tinged with tragedy, this week lifted the mood with something lighter.

Twenty years ago, a friend in Notting Hill had a call from David Hockney, a friend of his.

Hadn't he liked the artwork Hockney had sent him, demanded a querulous voice from Los Angeles. Our mutual friend was puzzled: nothing had been delivered.

Hockney, chuckling, explained that it wouldn't be arriving by post – that his latest, multi-part works were made to be faxed. But it turned out the artist had mis-dialled. Somewhere in London, someone had watched, mystified, as page after doodled page had churned from his fax machine, no doubt to be scrunched into balls and tossed, in annoyance, into a bin. How much is an original Hockney worth? It could keep a person from sleeping.

David Hockney has always been a playful artist and a geek, and both qualities are present in this story. The question of how much a Hockney is worth is hugely open to debate if that Hockney has been faxed. At the same time, there's no doubting the excitement this artist gets from technology. And the same applies now that the artist has discovered Photoshop.

The works in his new show, Drawing in a Printing Machine, are described as "inkjet-printed computer drawings". Using a graphic tablet and a tablet pen, Hockney has produced a series of images, some drawn, some a mix of drawing and photography, and one – a wall-length panorama called The Twenty -Five Big Trees between Bridlington School and Morrison's Supermarket on Bessingby Road, In the Semi-Egyptian Style – a photomontage. The foreground grass of this last work has some of Hockney's characteristic squiggles on it, but how small can an artist's input be before a work ceases to be by him? To what extent is a Hockney drawn on screen and run off a printer, a Hockney?

The answer to this last is: whatever the market decrees. The art of the past 80 years has been riven with work that questions the value of authorship – Duchamp's readymades, Warhol's screenprints – but Hockney differs in his old-fashioned attachment to drawing. These are not photographic reproductions but prints, he insists; not a rejection of tradition, but a refinement.

And what are they like, these works? Well, the portraits look like the crayon and gouache Hockneys of a couple of years ago. There are passages where you feel the artist's excitement at his recent plaything – the gestural pink table in his picture of Peter Goulds, say, but otherwise it's business as usual. The landscapes are more experimental and so more arresting, if patchier. Autumn Trees Near Thixendale is lovely, Hockney finding in the approximations of Photoshop's palette an accidental counterpoint to his own.

In the end, though, the works are rather like Hockney himself, the Bradford boy in Hollywood. One of the things he loves about Photoshop, he says, is that it is the art machine of the masses, that anyone can do it. Some of the new works look as though anyone has. Their price tags, however, do not.

To 11 Jul (020-7629 7578)

Independent Comment
blog comments powered by Disqus

Day In a Page

Apple admits it has a human rights problem

Apple admits it has a human rights problem

After years of complaints and workers' suicides in China the technology giant faces up to the human cost of its gadgets
Peter Moore: 'I feel guilty I'm the only one alive'

Peter Moore interview

'I feel guilty I'm the only one alive'
Sellafield faces nuclear option as overspending threatens plant's future

Sellafield faces nuclear option

Overspending threatens plant's future
Israel blames Iran for embassy bomb attacks

Israel blames Iran for embassy bomb attacks

Tehran rejects Netanyahu's 'lies' after diplomats in India and Georgia targeted
Former manager enjoying Apoel crack at the big time

Tommy Cassidy interview

Former manager enjoying Apoel crack at the big time
James Lawton: Patience may not be a virtue this time, Roman – Andre Villas-Boas looks all at sea

James Lawton: AVB looks all at sea

Abramovich's visits to training reinforce the idea of a coach feeling pressure from above and below
The 10 Best sledges

The 10 Best sledges

Not all of them require snow...
Procrastination: Not now – I'm busy

Procrastination: Not now – I'm busy

Confronting the real reasons for puttting things off can help us beat it
Fun in the sunset years

Fun in the sunset years

A new movie follows retirees moving to India for low-cost care and a culture of respect for the elderly. For many Britons, it's already a reality
Picture preview: Lucian Freud drawings

Lucian Freud drawings

Picture preview
Silent revolution at the Baftas as the French take top awards

Silent revolution at the Baftas

The Artist wins in seven categories, with Meryl Streep the other big success story
Whitney Houston: The diva who had – and lost – it all

The diva who had – and lost – it all

Nick Hasted charts the highs and lows of Whitney Houston's life
How Picasso won over (some of) the British

How Picasso won over (some of) the British

Winston Churchill and Evelyn Waugh hated his work, but Picasso provided inspiration for a whole generation of UK artists
Topshop: A Decade Of Design

Topshop: A Decade Of Design

When London Fashion Week starts on Friday, Topshop will celebrate 10 years backing its brightest young stars
John Prescott: 'My wife thought I'd just retire, but I'm not a slippers man'

'My wife thought I'd just retire, but I'm not a slippers man'

At 73, John Prescott isn't mellowing. In fact he's taking a shot at becoming a police commissioner