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Brian Sewell's rating
David Hockney RA: A Bigger Picture, Royal Academy - review
By
Brian Sewell
19 Jan 2012
My predominant response to David Hockney's exhibition of Yorkshire landscapes at the Royal Academy is "Why?". Why is there so much of it? Why is so much of it so big, so towering, so vast, so overblown and corpulent? Why is it so repetitive? Why is everything so unreally bright, so garish, discordant, raw and Romany? Why is the brushwork so careless, crude and coarse? For me this overwhelming accumulation of his recent work is the visual equivalent of being tied hand and foot and dumped under the loudspeakers of the Glastonbury Festival.
This exhibition is at the Royal Academy because it will bring in a multitude of punters and, with the outrageous admission price of £14, mightily increase the profits of the grand old whore of Piccadilly, masquerading as a charity. It is so big because Hockney, following the footsteps of Gormley, Kapoor and Gilbert and George, now works to fill the available space, and the "Bigger" of the title suggests that he has not yet identified the Biggest - but if he continues to follow Kapoor, he will, he will. It is repetitive because that is Hockney's way - he takes a subject and wrings it to exhaustion, constantly repeating tricks of handling to lend shallow interest to his fields of canvas. As for his discordant range of colour, I fell to wondering if he is the Monet of our day, his vision so dimmed by cataracts that he must paint in vile greens and viler purples if he is to see anything take shape on his innumerable canvases. And the brushwork is crude because that is what so easily happens when a painter works beyond his, or the subject's, natural scale, or does not care if, when a landscape requires the jigsawing of 50 canvases, the junctions are jerkily approximate.
As no one who knows anything of Yorkshire's wolds has ever seen them clad in the ghastly gaudiness of Hockney's vision, I must ask, if he is not purblind, from whom he borrows this jangling, jarring, grating palette? Has he, perhaps, a man of sudden enthusiasms who, on discovering the art and practice of watercolour only as late as 2002, immediately became the greatest watercolourist of all time, now just discovered the Fauve painters of Paris a century ago, Derain, Dufy, Vlaminck et al, and replaced them too, the wild man of the wolds, the savage of Scarborough, the beast of Bridlington? Fauvism was recently defined as "a movement characterised by a violence of colours, often applied unmixed from tubes of paint in broad flat areas, by spontaneity and roughness of execution, and by a bold sense of surface design"; to make it the perfect fit for Hockney we need only add the occasional employment of heavy outlines and dependence on recurring detail.
It matters not at all if, in his dotage (he was born in 1937 on the day that Ethiopians devote to Pontius Pilate), his work is nourished by a new influence. His apologists are almost too anxious to declare his kinships with Brueghel and Turner, Van Gogh and Picasso, and his variations on a theme by Claude - dubbed by Hockney himself "A bigger message after Claude Lorrain's Sermon on the Mount" - form a whole section of the exhibition, but of the Fauves there is no mention, nor of Walt Disney, whose Bambi would be comfortably at home in all these paintings.
If he denies the Fauves their influence, then perhaps we should look at their near contemporaries in England, at the work of Harold Gilman and Spencer Gore, and even to Gore's long-lived son Frederick who, as a Royal Academician, overlapped with Hockney. Those who delighted in the way that Freddy Gore, well into his nineties and the first years of this century, continued to hack out the landscape formula that Hockney now enlists and with the same bright vulgarity, will at once recognise the close parallel.
For all their up-to-the-minute modernity in Kapoorian scale and the smell of ill-considered paint still drying, these landscape vastnesses are disconcertingly old-fashioned. Technically much the same, technologically Hockney's work is very different from that of his more modest predecessors. The Fauves, the New English Art Clubbers and Freddy Gore brushed paint onto single canvases of unambitious size; so too does Hockney, but some are almost as large as Leonardo's Last Supper, and in most of his recent work the motif is spread over an assemblage of anything from two to fifty-two canvases abutting each other in a rectangle. This industrial scale apparently requires an industrial approach, and technologies far loftier than the low technology of brush and paint come into play. Conventional drawing we should expect, and it is present; photography we should, perhaps, forgive, and it too plays its part in the production of a painting and, independently, it is included in the exhibition; but should we not dig in our heels and resist when Hockney pays homage to such mysteries as synchronised printing, digital video stills, the simultaneous operation of nine cameras, and the iPhone and iPad as instruments of drawing?
David has always adopted new technologies as they became available - the computer, the fax machine, the photocopier, the Polaroid and so on (and we all know how the Polaroid collages lost their colour and definition, and the faxes faded into oblivion) - but I feel compelled to ask if, for all this gadgetry, his paintings have improved.
They have increased mightily in number, but in quality they have, no matter what the subject, as mightily deteriorated. There was a time in the 1970s when I thought him one of the best draughtsmen of the 20th century, wonderfully skilful, observant, subtle, sympathetic, spare, every touch of pencil, pen or crayon essential to the evocation of the subject, whether it be a portrait or light flooding a sparse room; nothing has made me change that view, but Hockney has tried very hard. As a painter he has never had so sure a touch, has always seemed mannered, always a borrower affecting this approach and that (and in his heyday, very well) and, as though uncertain with the material of paint, has used it to colour between the lines rather than create with it the structure, form, volume, texture, atmosphere and space of whatever different reality lies beyond the picture plane. Now, in this new work, every blade of grass, every stalk of stubble, every hedgerow flower is reduced to a cypher and, when diminished by erratic perspective, to a blur.
In old age [Hockney is 74] he has acquired a clumsy bravura and he strokes, stabs and dabs the canvas with seeming confidence, but in truth much of this is the stuff of habitual gesture, of industry, repetitive, for he knows no other way of covering such an acreage of canvas. He is surrounded by sycophants, none of whom has the honesty to tell him what he needs to know - that he has fallen far from the saturated brilliance of his last brief fling with quality, the Grand Canyon drawings and paintings of 1998 or so, one of which acts as a benchmark in the scene-setting first room of the exhibition; no one has warned him that in dogged repetition what fire he once had has become a thing of ash and ember; and no one has dared suggest that though all the cocksure recent stuff dashed off for the exhibition works well as braggadocio, it is ultimately dull.
Indeed, half these pictures are fit only for the railings of Green Park, across the way from the Royal Academy, and would never be accepted for the Summer Exhibition were they sent in under pseudonyms.
As for Hockney's rivalry with his master, Claude, this is sickening impertinence, contemptible.
Hockney is not another Turner expressing, in high seriousness, his debt to the old master; Hockney is not another Picasso teasing Velázquez and Delacroix with not quite enough wit; here Hockney is a vulgar prankster, trivialising not only a painting that he is incapable of understanding and could never execute, but in involving him in the various parodies, demeaning Picasso too.
David Hockney: A Bigger Picture is at the Royal Academy, W1 (020 7300 8000, royalacademy.org.uk) until April 9. Open Sun-Thurs, 10am-6pm; Fri, 10am-10pm; Sat, 9am-10pm. Admission £14 (concs available)
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
Reader views (31)
There's no point in criticising Brian Sewell. It won't penetrate his thick skin of self-satisfaction. It's better not to pay any attention to the outbursts of the silly old queen, but go and see the exhibition yourself. - I did, and loved the glorious Yorkshire landscapes in riotous colour - the bigger the better!
- James Cormick, Cambridge, UK, 15/02/2012 12:53
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contd.
In old age and in his dotage [he is 81] Sewell has acquired a clumsy bravura and he strokes, stabs and scrawls the page with seeming confidence, but in truth much of this is the stuff of habitual gesture, of industry, repetitive, verbose, for he knows no other way of covering such an acreage of sheets of paper. He is surrounded by sycophants, none of whom has the honesty to tell him what he needs to know - that he has fallen far from the saturated brilliance of long past, brief fling with quality and is ultimately dull - a prisoner of South London suburbia.
- Stephen Botterill, London, 09/02/2012 22:25
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My predominant response to Brian Sewell's review of David Hockney's Yorkshire landscapes at the Royal Academy is "Why?". Why is there so much of it? Why is so much so overblown, corpulent and verbose? I thought Mr. Hockney's works were wonderfully skilful, observant, subtle, sympathetic, every touch of paint, pencil, charcoal, iPad, essential to the evocation of their subject.
- Stephen Botterill, London, 09/02/2012 22:06
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Mr. Sewell is correct in saying many of these BIG works are slapdash and the colour is indeed gaudy. However, there is no need to take such relish in destroying a once-great artist simply because his latest show does not match the superb art of his first twenty years.
David Hockney peaked too soon, perhaps.
His engravings and drawings were splendid and he was recognised and praised immediately for those important talents.
He was never that good at handling paint.
I think he made a mistake with Californian colour applied to the Yorkshire more subtle landscapes, but I have heard his water-colours and charcoal drawings are wonderful.
Mr. Sewell knows that a negative review gets more attention than a positive one, but in this case, given the greatness of Hockney's previous work, it would have been nice if he'd concentrated on the good things and just said he was disappointed in the bad ones.
- Amanda Partridge, Bristol, 05/02/2012 12:58
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I have no doubt that being dumped under the loudspeakers of the Glastonbury Festival (tied hand and foot or no) is the wet dream of many a music festival enthusiast, which is precisely why we wouldn't pay any attention to a review of said Festival penned by Mr Sewell. Perhaps the Evening Standard needs to better consider its choice of critics, dependent on the genre of the subject matter? Or am I missing something here? Perhaps unlike music, the scope and appeal of fine art is so narrow as to require only a single, elitist gendering and critique. What do I know? Contrary to Mr Sewell's opinions I was blown away by the exhibition and left with a profound and renewed pride to be British. I'm clearly an idiot proletarian, cursed with a naively joyful reaction to simple beauty. Poor me. Turn up the volume.
- Shaun Luke, Meopham, England, 04/02/2012 15:16
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Michael Higgins, York.
"The fact that Hockney's work results in such discussion means he has succeeded"?
I have heard this nonsensical argument many times and can only ask "WHY?"
An artist is supposed to succeed at ART not controversy.
This is a deserved critical review, stating very frankly that Mr. Hockney has lost his magic touch.
I agree with Brian Sewell 100% and I used to admire Hockney more than anyone, but subtle and attractive these landscapes are NOT, and if you disagree, Mr.
Higgins, that does NOT mean Hockney has succeeded, it just proves that some people like him and some see through him.
Remember, you cannot fool all the people all the time, not even if you make VERY BIG paintings!
- sidney marks, London England, 03/02/2012 15:44
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I too made the connection with the ageing Monet before reading BS's review. DH's 'autumn' colours remind me of nothing so much as a nice trifle! DH has gained the dreaded 'national treasure' status, after which one can do no wrong in the eyes of the public. There is some fine stuff and DH is a fine & serious artist, but let's discriminate please.
- johnny.r, London W4, 02/02/2012 11:39
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As much as I hate to admit it, Brian Sewell's review is spot on. There are 3 or 4 great paintings in Hockney's exhibition, but most of it seems clumsy, dejá vu, and repeated ad nauseum. I couldn't wait to get out of there.
- Ray G., London, 29/01/2012 20:04
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Sewell has completely missed the entire point of Hockney. What a completely pointless review. Fair enough you may not like Hockney's style but the whole point of him is that you stand in front of one of his paintings and get the sublime feel that the English landscape is all about. What a wrong and ridiculous review the exhibition was spectacular, breathtaking and inspirational. He knew he was exhibiting at the RA anyway and wanted to fill the huge walls with his superb landscapes. Ignore this review, Sewell like usual is just trying to be different and go against something that everyone else has quite rightly raved about.
- Claire Organ, Bournemouth, 29/01/2012 12:12
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A very witty and courageous review, it’s good to see Brian Sewell criticise Hockney. The paintings look like scenery back drops for the theatre. I always see Hockney as an illustrator; never much of a real painter, his work lacks the sensitivity of handling in a creative way. In truly great painting there is always something magical in the handling of paint, a synthesis between idea and medium, as in late Titian and Rembrandt work. In Hockney all you get is some kind of vanity, lots of melodrama without any real visual insight into the subject.
For great English landscape painting it is best to go and have a look the small Constable sketches in the V&A or Turner at the Tate, Paul Nash or even Ivan Hitchens when he is at his best. These paintings have a sense of inner scale and colour that communicates a real feeling for the landscape, both in a perceptive and imaginative way. Their paintings are uplifting and slowly reveal the layers of feeling expressed by their material quality and draw you in without all that showmanship found in Hockney.
- Mark Ainsworth, Bangor Down, 28/01/2012 17:47
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A very witty and courageous review, it’s good to see Brian Sewell criticise Hockney. The paintings look like scenery back drops for the theatre. I always see Hockney as an illustrator; never much of a real painter, his work lacks the sensitivity of handling in a creative way. In truly great painting there is always something magical in the handling of paint, a synthesis between idea and medium, as in late Titian and Rembrandt work. In Hockney all you get is some kind of vanity, lots of melodrama without any real visual insight into the subject.
For great English landscape painting it is best to go and have a look the small Constable sketches in the V&A or Turner at the Tate, Paul Nash or even Ivan Hitchens when he is at his best. These paintings have a sense of inner scale and colour that communicates a real feeling for the landscape, both in a perceptive and imaginative way. They are uplifting and slowly reveal the layers of feeling expressed by their material quality and draw you in without all that showmanship found in Hockney.
- Mark Ainsworth, Bangor Down, 28/01/2012 17:30
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A very witty and courageous review, it’s good to see Brian Sewell criticise Hockney. The paintings look like scenery back drops for the theatre. I always see Hockney as an illustrator; never much of a real painter, his work lacks the sensitivity of handling in a creative way. In truly great painting there is always something magical in the handling of paint, a synthesis between idea and medium, as in late Titian and Rembrandt work. In Hockney all you get is some kind of vanity, lots of melodrama without any real visual insight into the subject.
For great English landscape painting it is best to go and have a look the small Constable sketches in the V&A or Turner at the Tate, Paul Nash or even Ivan Hitchens when he is at his best. These paintings have a sense of inner scale and colour that communicates a real feeling for the landscape, both in a perceptive and imaginative way. They are uplifting and slowly reveal the layers of feeling expressed by their material quality and draw you in without all that showmanship found in Hockney.
- Mark Ainsworth, Bangor Down, 28/01/2012 17:29
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A courageous very witty and courageous review, it’s good to see Brian Sewell criticise Hockney. The paintings look like scenery back drops for the theatre. I always see Hockney as an illustrator; never much of a real painter, his work lacks the sensitivity of handling in a creative way. In truly great painting there is always something very magical in the handling of paint, a synthesis between idea and medium as in late Titian and Rembrandt. In Hockney all you get is some kind of vanity, lots of melodrama without any real visual insight into the subject.
For great English landscape painting it is best to go and have a look the small Constable sketches in the V&A or Turner at the Tate, Paul Nash or even Ivan Hitchens when he is at his best. These paintings have a sense of inner scale and colour that communicates a real feeling for the landscape, both in a perceptive and imaginative way. They are uplifting and slowly reveal the layers of feeling expressed by their material quality and draw you in without all that showmanship found in Hockney.
- Mark Ainsworth, Bangor Down, 28/01/2012 17:17
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Brian, much as I love your waspish reviews and expert bull-sh*t detection (Tr*cy Em*n et al)I fear you've overdone it a bit on this one. Yes, you will find sloppy paintings, a whole room that attempts a Paul Nash-type surrealism but doesn't come off and a series of Sermon on the Mount paintings that are , in the words of Alexander Armstrong, 'pointless'. Yes, parts of it are disappointing if you were lucky eneough to see the Tom Thompson and Group of Seven at Dulwich recently. However, if you persevere, there are many treats...The wonderful (charcoal) studies in many rooms. Walk past the video screens to the smallest room and savour the exceptional sketch books. Far from being 'gaudy', I thought many of the paintings - 'Winter Timber -2009'- had superb dream-like qualities.If you like water colours, there is a whole wall to examine and enjoy. Brian, keep up the struggle for 'real' art but on this exhibition review you only get half marks!
- Rank Outsider, Brighton, England, 28/01/2012 15:44
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I cried when i saw these paintings last week, thet were of the very roads i and my now dead brother cycled along each summer, full of heat and light. they are not perfect or wonderful but they are real, and they make you feel that you can do such painting yourself , Hockney connects because you can see how he does it, and you feel you can do it too.
Brian Sewell and all estblishment figures disklike Hockney because the public love him and hate the crap reviewers produce. Up yours Brian. You aint so young yourself mate.
- Trevor Naylor, Cairo , but born and raised in Hull, 26/01/2012 09:00
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I have folowed Mr. Hockneys prodigious output for mmany years and have read much of his scholarly theory behind the art he creates. These Yorkshire paintings are the strongest and most and most wonderful paintings of his long and storied career. I've been to the Wolds of East Yorkshire feel he has catured their colorful beauty with awesome invention.
By the way Mr. Sewell, what are you ON?
- Bing, Gloucester MA USA, 21/01/2012 22:59
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The fact that Hockney's work has resulted in such discussion means he has succeeded. Art should be controversial, not bland, establishment or subject to the whims of octogenarian critics.
- Michael Higgins, York, England, 21/01/2012 21:28
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I never thought I would find myself in total agreement with Brian Sewell. Hockney was a very good,interesting artist in his younger days. Now he has completely lost it.Very few of the critics have had the courage to go against the adulation of the blind - a clear case of the Emperor's New Clothes.
- Richard, London, 21/01/2012 15:36
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Is this some sort of personal vendetta, Mr. Sewell? It certainly reads this way. I have no clue, what Yorkshire Wolds look like, nor should it matter. You prefer smooth brushstrokes to rough ones? You like modestly sized paintings? These are undoubtedly valuable thoughts. Yet, having just read your article, the only point that still rings in my mind, probably because of its incessant repetition, is your opinion that Mr. Hockney is too old for such excesses and should limit himself to something more sensible.
I don't like every one of these paintings. But I find many of them poetic, odd, awkward, beautiful, ambitious, imprudent - the qualities that make art. I believe they deserve better then what you just dished out.
- Alex Kanevsky, Philadelphia, USA, 21/01/2012 04:25
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Hockney, as always, is the master of composition. Recall his portraiture and californian series. But, the execution of many of these recent Yorkshire paintings is, sadly, rather poor. Brian Sewell is absolutely right about this. Some of these multi-canvases were completed in just 3 days. Why? More time spent on considered brushwork would have transformed these paintings into something splendid. Inspired by Monet and Van Gough perhaps, but these vast works simply looked like under-painting, unfinished and neglected.
- J Stevenson, London, 20/01/2012 23:15
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Would Brian Sewell please tell us which places in the Wolds he is familiar with, and at what times of the year?
- Michael Place, London England, 20/01/2012 09:58
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Well said, Brian. Hockney seems to have lost all talent. Horribly garish - I laughed at the comments saying Yorkshire really looks like that.
- v thompson, hythe, 20/01/2012 07:50
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The pinch-lipped Brian Sewell would do well to nip up the East Coast mainline and savour the unique light that bathes Yorkshire. There is a vibrancy to the variegated palettes of our biggest county, far more scintillating on the eyeball than Constable's Suffolk, that delivers fresh delights as we round the next bend, and crest the next hill. Britain's climate rewards us with many beautiful landscapes - and while Ruskin may have proclaimed Wales to possess the most beautiful estuary in the world at the Mawddach, I'll swear that east Yorkshire, the place of my birth, has the greeniest and purpliest of wolds anywhere in the world.
- E. B. A. Gumm, Nithering-in-the-Vale, Yorks., 20/01/2012 05:33
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Isn't this review a rehash of a previous Hockney show? I suspect Hockney will be delighted with the comparison to Monet and the Fauvists! I went to the exhibition this week and two things stood out: the continuing mastery of drawing, especially in charcoal, and the sheer variety of approach and technique. Isn't it just too lazy of Brian Sewell to tar the whole output with the same tired brush!
- Hugo On, London, 20/01/2012 03:19
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It is increasingly hard to see the difference between Art and commercial art and design....and I see advertising design more than Art in the landscape series by Hockney.
I do however think Hockney's embrace of new technology as implements with which to make art DO NEED to be used and experimented with and Brian, you are wrong to castigate him on that.
- Tallulah, Hove, UK, 19/01/2012 22:50
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What Hockney has done is to capture the very essence of the Yorkshire Wolds and he has done this quite brilliantly. Our fear is that this will lead to an influx of new visitors to an as yet undiscovered part of the country. Thankfully and obviously this won't include Brian Sewell who is much better off staying in central London pretending he knows something about East Yorkshire.
- Neil and Sally Hobbs, East Yorkshire, 19/01/2012 21:55
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I live not too far from where David Hockney has spent the last few years painting and ipading the Yorkshire Wolds on Woldgate and other parts of the Wolds towards York. I believe that he has captured the countryside around the town where he currently lives fantastically. I know most of the locations where the paintings were done.
- Simon, Bridlington, East Yorkshire, 19/01/2012 20:37
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As well as an Artist he is also a first rate Designer , as far as Modern Artists go he is definitely in my top three.
Good luck with this exhibition David.!!
Everybody can paint pictures you just do it far better than any one else.
- Davey_Buoy, Chertsey, 19/01/2012 16:43
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I have never read such vindictive tripe as this.
I haven't been to the exhibition but have seen many of the works at Salt's Mill. Personally I feel Hockney has managed to distil the essence of the Wolds.
By the way - the Hockney Gallery at Salts is free and a perfect base for his work.
- Terryed to, Hennebont France, 19/01/2012 15:52
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Well done Brian, another dim-witted and rambling account; full of sweeping statements and a personal attack. You said it yourself, it will bring in the punters. Why do you suppose that is? Because Hockney has inspired an audience. And what is the purpose of art? To please the 'critics'? No.
- Anthony Garratt, Bristol, 19/01/2012 14:21
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I think David's pictures are wonderful and bring so muc light and colour into our dull lives of politicians and bankers and money traders, selfish, self-centred, money and limelight grabbers.
- albert hall, hove england, 19/01/2012 13:53
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