In the Mood for Love: Hockney in London, 1960-1963

David Hockney - The Cha-Cha that was Danced in the Early Hours of 24th March 1961 

"What an artist is trying to do for people is bring them closer to something, because of course art is about sharing. You wouldn't be an artist unless you wanted to share an experience, a thought." - David Hockney

David Hockney's early work is among my favourite of his ouevre. I enjoy the delicate dance between loose figuration and both painterly and hard-edge abstraction with added letters and numbers representing personal ciphers. It was a joy then to visit Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert's gallery once again in St James's to view this intimately scaled show of Hockney paintings completed whilst still a student at the Royal College of Art and more, before he would leave these shores to forge a new life in America. Its modest scale is in direct contrast to the huge career-long retrospective survey of the 87 year old artists' work running concurrently at Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris. Many of the paintings on display here at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert are being exhibited together for the first time. Hockney was an out gay man and happily gives an insight into his lifestyle in these paintings at a time before homosexuality was decriminalised in 1967. Images of phallic shapes, young men, drag queens and paintings with titles such as Erection, Thrust and The Love Paintings are executed with a bawdy sense of humour and certainly announce his sexual proclivities unapologetically. This boldness won Hockney many fans who snapped up the paintings from his then dealer John Kasmin who spotted Hockney's artistic potential at this early stage. Kasmin's grandson Louis, incidentally was responsible for curating this show. Hockney would go on to be a great colourist and their are certainly hints of this here with flashes of vivid reds, pinks and oranges in the paintings. His love of the printmaking process is also very much in evidence with a magnificent suite of his Rake's Progress etchings dominating one wall of a gallery. Visitors to the exhibition can also see the excellent Myself and My Heroes, The Diploma and The Hypnotist etchings. It is interesting to note that Hockney only turned to print whilst at the RCA because he'd run out of money for canvas and paint and the RCA printmaking department offered free materials. Drawing has always been a constant for Hockney. His observational and recording skills are second to none. Drawing is the true talent that underpins his art and is evidenced in the etchings here and in many of the paintings also. He would go on to demonstrate his mastery of line in later, more representational figurative drawings in the next decade. This is an interesting show in that many of the works are lesser-known and show a young Hockney having moved to the capital from Bradford fully engaging in the gay lifestyle as well as immersing himself into the artworld of the period absorbing ideas from contemporary art of the time before he would go on to fully develop his own style in California.  

A Rake's Progress, 1963

My Carol for Comrades and Lovers, 1960

For the Dear Love of Comrades, 1961

Untitled (Peter), 1960

I Luv /Sam, 1960

Untitled (3), 1960

Composition (Thrust), 1960

Heaven Perpendicular, c.1960-61

Erection, c.1959-60

Hairy Legs, 1961

Study for 'Shame', 1960

Study for 'My Name is Ann', 1960

The First Love Painting, 1960

We Two Boys Together Clinging, 1961

Composition e3, 1960

I'm in the Mood for Love, 1961

The Last of England?, 1961

Demonstration of Versatility - Swiss Landscape in a Scenic Style, c.1962

Colonial Governor, 1962

Myself and My Heroes, 1961

The Diploma, 1962

Life Painting for Myself, 1962

The Cha-Cha that was Danced in the Early Hours of 24th March 1961, 1961

The Salesman, 1963

Two Friends (in a Cul-de-Sac), 1963

Kaisarion and all his beauty, 1961

Kaisarion, 1960

Tree?, 1962

The Hypnotist, 1963

Figure Being Hypnotised, 1963

Untitled, 1963

In the Mood for Love: Hockney in London, 1960-1963

until 18th July

Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert

38 Bury Street

St James's

London

SW1Y

Siena: The Rise of Painting 1300-1350

 

Medieval Siena was apparently a city famed for its beautiful striped cathedral, its dramatic Palio horse races, its goldsmiths as well as some wonderful artists. It was a wealthy city being a centre for banking and trade. It was also a very cosmopolitan city from this commerce and for being a stop along a pilgrim route known as the Via Francigena. As a result Siena was open to artistic influences from other cultures in particular France which is seen in the exhibition in the form of carved ivories and illuminated manuscripts. Siena's halcyon days came to an end with the spread of the Black Death in 1348. This exhibition aims to capture some of the last fifty years or so of the greatness of the Siena of old seen through the paintings and textiles of the period, most of which have survived in extraordinarily good condition. The Virgin Mary was the patron of Siena and her image features heavily here in shimmering golden devotional altar pieces of various sizes by the artists who made the city famous such as Duccio, Simone Martini and the Lorenzetti brothers. All the gold of the altar pieces is shown off to dazzling perfection in the darkened gallery rooms of the National and there is much to see and take in. The Maestá altar piece (1308-11), forms the centre-piece of this exhibition, in the central octagonal hall. The Maestà – majesty – was placed on the high altar of the Siena cathedral. It was an object of wonder. The main scene, fully 13ft wide, showed the Virgin and Child enthroned, attended by ten saints, 20 angels and ten apostles. Surrounding this picture were nearly 40 other painted panels: above her was a series depicting episodes from her life and death; in the predella – a frieze of small narrative paintings – beneath, were scenes from the Nativity and early life of Christ. They were meant to be read like a comic strip by the faithful. Because the Maestà was free-standing, the reverse was just as stunning, covered with paintings too, nearly 50 panels showing acts of Christ’s teaching and his Passion. Both front and back were topped by an array of angels. The whole structure, five square metres of carving, gilding and painting, was as much a work of architecture as art, resembling the facade of a cathedral topped with finials and gothic pediments. Alongside Giotto’s frescoes in the Upper Basilica at Assisi, the Maestà has traditionally been held as the starting point of early Renaissance art history. In it, the artist Duccio made significant advances that broke from the hieratic nature of Byzantine art: there are narrative scenes, nuanced emotion, an array of settings – landscapes, urban views, interiors – greater three-dimensionality and informality, the integration of figures into believable space, and lots of small incidental details for worshippers rather than exclusively for the clerical viewer. The paintings also related to another of his innovations: the pioneering of portable, multi-panel, devotional works. All these traits would become staples of Renaissance art. Before encountering The Maestá, though, the first room of the exhibition gives us an introduction to Duccio, who was active in Siena, in the late 13th and early 14th centuries. Although not much is known about his life, his reputation sees him regarded as one of the greatest Italian painters of the Middle Ages completing important works of art in government and religious buildings around Italy. Duccio worked on wood panel, painting in egg tempera embellished with gold leaf. He was a master of tempera and his style was similar to Byzantine art in certain aspects, with its gold backgrounds and religious scenes. However, it was also different and more experimental. Duccio broke down the sharp lines of Byzantine art, softening his figures faces, hands, and feet by using modelling to reveal the structure of said figures beneath their clothing making them appear more three-dimensional. Duccio was also noted for his complex organization of space. He was one of the first painters to put figures in architectural settings exploring a sense of depth and space. Duccio was also notable for attempting to portray emotion and tenderness in his figures towards each other which is a trait not seen in contemporary painters at this time. This is evidenced in the numerous paintings of Christ and the Virgin in the exhibition where Mary demonstrates a naturalistic mothers love for her child. Duccio is also admired as a colourist and visitors will be rewarded as they see the jewel-like colours which glow jewel-like against the gold leaf in the dark of this exhibition. Other important artists of the period such as Simone Martini and Ambrogio Lorenzetti are also given their dues here with some equally gorgeous paintings, the former with four panels from the Orsini altarpiece. This is an unashamedly Christian-focused exhibition, and one which contains a great sense of spirituality and almost the sense of a pilgrimage or worship. It certainly gave me a sense of inner peace, contemplation and much spiritual food for thought.

Siena: The Rise of Painting 1300-1350

until 22nd June

The National Gallery

Trafalgar Square

London

WC2N