became known as a central figure of British art in the 1960’s and continues to be widely celebrated as one of the most influential artists of our time.
Born in Bradford in 1937, he graduated from the Bradford School of Art in 1957 and studied at the Royal College of Art from 1959–62. Alongside his prodigious painting and drawing practice, he has constantly explored new technological possibilities in making art. In the 1980’s he embraced Polaroid film, photocopying and faxing and, more recently, digital media including photoshop and his iPad and iPhone as new means of conceiving and creating mesmerising multiple view and composite images. Now in his eighties, Hockney continues to create new works in all media with his unwavering desire to continually challenge conventions of perspective in art and how we truly ‘see’.
Hockney has had solo exhibitions at important international museums and galleries since his early career. More recently, in 2025 a retrospective exhibition was held at the Louis Vuitton Foundation in Paris, France. In 2023-4 the National Portrait Gallery, London held the exhibition Drawing From Life and in 2021 The Royal Academy of Arts in London held the exhibition, David Hockney; The Arrival of Spring, Normandy 2020. In 2019 a major exhibition Hockney – Van Gogh, The Joy of Nature was held at the Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam and again in 2021 at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas. A wide-reaching retrospective of his work was shown at Tate Britain, London (2017); the Centre Pompidou, Paris (2017) and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2018). The exhibition, 82 Portraits and 1 Still Life was organized by the Royal Academy, London (2016) and travelled to Ca’ Pesaro, Venice (2017), the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Spain (2017-8) and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2018). His paintings, drawings, video works and prints of all media are widely represented in major Museum and Public Collections worldwide.
