The final say on the most colorful and controversial artist at work today: David Hockney.
In this fascinating and entertaining second volume, Christopher Sykes explores the life and work of our most popular living artist.
David Hockney's career has spanned the past five decades. Volume 1, A Rake's Progress, covered his early life: his precocious achievement at Bradford Art College and the Swinging Sixties in London, where he befriended many of the iconic cultural figures of the generation. Picking up Hockney's story in 1975, this volume, A Pilgrim's Progress, finds him traveling between Notting Hill and California, where he took inspiration for the swimming pool series of paintings; creating the acclaimed set designs for operas around the world; and embracing emerging technologies—the camera and fax machine in the 1970s and 1980s, and, most recently, the iPad. Hockney's boundless energy extends to his personal life too, and this volume illuminates his glamorous social life as well as his sometimes turbulent relationships.
With unprecedented access to Hockney's paintings, notebooks, diaries, and the man himself, this second volume continues the lively and revelatory account of an acclaimed artist and an extraordinary man.
"Drawing on interviews with Hockney, his siblings, and colleagues; Hockey's autobiography; and diaries of famous friends, such as Christopher Isherwood and Stephen Spender, Sykes matches his subject's ebullience in this admiring, well-researched life." —Kirkus Reviews
"Sykes continues his meticulously detailed, multivolume biography of the ever-replenishing font of creativity that is artist David Hockney ... Sykes articulates all the verve, ingenuity, and complex struggles involved in the protean Hockney’s deep inquiry into the nature of perception while also illuminating his influences, from his 'great hero,' Picasso, to Ingres, Thomas Moran, and Chinese scrolls, and recounting his eager embrace of new technologies and the resultant complex photo collages, sumptuous iPad drawings, and stunning, high definition videos." —Booklist
