Walk into any major gallery today and you’ll see people crowded around a massive, multi-paneled landscape that looks like it was painted with neon light. It’s vibrant. It’s huge. It’s almost definitely a Hockney.
David Hockney is basically the world's most famous living painter, and honestly, he should have retired decades ago if he followed the traditional "tortured artist" trajectory. Instead, the guy is in his late 80s and still outworking people half his age. He’s obsessed. Whether it’s the shimmering blue of a Los Angeles swimming pool or the muddy ruts of a Yorkshire country lane, artwork by David Hockney has this weird way of making you look at the world like you’ve just had your eyes cleaned.
He doesn't do boring.
📖 Related: Fata Morgana Mediterranean Cuisine Menu: What to Actually Order for the Real Experience
Most people know him for the pools. You’ve seen A Bigger Splash on a tote bag or a postcard somewhere. It’s that flat, bright, pop-art aesthetic that defined 1960s California. But if you stop there, you’re missing the point of why he’s actually important. Hockney isn't just a "pool guy." He’s a relentless tinkerer who refuses to be bored by a single medium. He’s jumped from oil paint to acrylics, then to massive photo-collages, then to stage design for the opera, and now to iPads.
The Myth of the Simple Swimming Pool
People love the pools because they look like a vacation. But look closer. In Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures)—which, by the way, sold for about $90 million back in 2018—there’s this incredible tension. You have one guy standing on the edge, looking down at a figure swimming underwater. The water isn't just blue; it’s a complex grid of white lines and distorted shapes.
Hockney was obsessed with how to represent water. Think about it. Water is transparent, it’s constantly moving, and it has no fixed shape. How do you paint that?
He spent years trying to solve that puzzle. It wasn’t about being "pretty." It was a technical challenge. He used thin rollers, scrubbing brushes, and even dental tools to get those textures right. When we talk about artwork by David Hockney, we’re talking about a guy who really, deeply looks at things. He once said that most people just scan the ground so they don't trip, but they don't actually see the beauty in a puddle or a shadow.
Moving Beyond the 60s: The Yorkshire Transformation
By the early 2000s, everyone thought they had Hockney figured out. He was the LA guy. The sun-drenched, color-saturated British expat. Then he moved back to Bridlington, a somewhat chilly seaside town in East Yorkshire.
It changed everything.
✨ Don't miss: Weather in Louisville KY in September: What Most People Get Wrong
He started painting the English countryside, but not in that stuffy, 19th-century way you see in dusty museums. He went big. Bigger Trees Near Warter is massive—it’s made of 50 separate canvases joined together. Why? Because he wanted to capture the scale of being in the woods, not just looking at a tiny window of them.
He’d go out in his SUV, loaded with canvases, and paint in the rain, the snow, and the biting wind. He wanted to capture the "arrival of spring." It sounds cheesy until you see the paintings. The greens are so bright they practically vibrate. He noticed that the hawthorn blossoms looked like "thick cream" spilled over the hedges.
Why the iPad changed his life
A lot of art purists hated it when Hockney started using an iPhone and then an iPad to draw. They thought it was a gimmick. It wasn't.
For Hockney, the iPad was a tool for speed. He could wake up, see the light hitting the trees at 6:00 AM, and start drawing immediately without having to mix paints or clean brushes. He could send these drawings to his friends instantly. "I’m drawing the dawn," he’d tell them.
There’s a specific quality to the iPad artwork by David Hockney. The lines are fluid. The colors are backlit, literally, by the screen. He realized that the device allowed him to layer colors in a way that oil paint doesn't. You don't have to wait for the first layer to dry. You just keep going. It’s pure, unfiltered observation.
The Perspective Problem (And Why He Hates Cameras)
Here is something kinda controversial about Hockney: he thinks photography is a bit of a lie.
He argues that a camera sees the world through a single point—the lens. But humans don’t work like that. We have two eyes. We move our heads. We look at a person’s eyes, then their hands, then the background. Our vision is a composite of many different moments in time.
This led to his famous "Joiners."
He would take dozens, sometimes hundreds, of Polaroid or 35mm photos of a single scene—like a road in Death Valley or a friend sitting in a chair—and then piece them together into a giant collage. They look fractured and jittery. They aren't "perfect," and that’s the point. They represent how we actually experience space.
When you look at his later paintings, you’ll notice they often have "reverse perspective." Instead of everything getting smaller as it moves toward the horizon, things sometimes get wider or stay the same size. He wants to pull the viewer into the painting, rather than keeping them at a distance. He wants you to feel like you’re walking through the space, not just staring at a flat image on a wall.
What Most People Get Wrong About His "Simple" Style
Critics sometimes dismiss Hockney because his work is "joyful."
In the high-stakes world of contemporary art, there’s often a feeling that if it’s not dark, depressing, or incredibly confusing, it’s not "serious." Hockney ignores that. He thinks pleasure is a valid goal for art. But don’t mistake "joyful" for "easy."
✨ Don't miss: KitchenAid Speed Control Plate: Why Your Stand Mixer Only Has One Speed
The draftsmanship required to do what he does is insane. He spent years drawing from life every single day. If you look at his early etchings, like the Rake’s Progress series, you see a master of line. He can convey an entire personality with three strokes of a pen.
He’s also incredibly well-read. He wrote an entire book called Secret Knowledge where he used his "artist’s eye" to prove that old masters like Vermeer and Caravaggio used optical devices (lenses and mirrors) to help them paint. It caused a massive stir in the academic world. Some historians were furious. Hockney just shrugged. He knew what he was seeing because he’s spent 70 years looking at how images are made.
How to Value and Collect Hockney Today
If you’re looking to get into artwork by David Hockney, you probably aren't buying an original oil painting unless you have a spare $50 million. But because he was so prolific with printmaking and digital art, there is a lot more out there than you might think.
- Lithographs and Etchings: These are his bread and butter. Pieces from the 60s and 70s are highly prized, especially his portraits of friends like Celia Birtwell.
- iPad Prints: These are often released in editions. While they are "digital," they are still signed and numbered, and the market for them has stayed surprisingly strong.
- Photographic Joiners: These are rarer on the secondary market but represent a huge part of his mid-career shift.
The thing to watch out for is the condition of the paper. Hockney loved experimenting with different stocks, and some of the older prints can be prone to "foxing" (those little brown spots) if they weren't stored in climate-controlled environments.
The Immersive Shift: Lightroom and Beyond
Recently, Hockney has moved into "immersive" art.
In London, he launched a show called Bigger & Closer (not smaller & further away). It’s a massive room where his paintings are projected onto the walls, floor, and ceiling, accompanied by music and his own voice explaining the work.
Some people call it a "tourist trap." Others find it moving. Honestly, it’s just Hockney being Hockney. He’s always been interested in how technology can expand the way we see. He isn't afraid of the "new." He’s currently exploring how AI might (or might not) be useful for artists, though he remains skeptical that a machine can ever truly see the way a human heart does.
Actionable Steps for Art Enthusiasts
If you want to truly understand Hockney’s impact, don't just look at a screen. You need to see the scale in person.
- Visit the Tate Britain or the V&A: These institutions hold some of his most important early works. Standing in front of Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy is a totally different experience than seeing it in a book. The life-sized scale makes the silence in the room feel heavy.
- Read "Secret Knowledge": Even if you aren't an art historian, his breakdown of how the Old Masters used tech will change how you look at every painting in a museum. It’s like a detective story for art lovers.
- Practice "Active Looking": Hockney’s biggest lesson isn't about how to paint; it’s about how to see. Next time you’re outside, try to find five different shades of green in a single tree. Notice where the shadows aren't just black, but purple or blue.
- Track Auction Results: If you’re interested in the investment side, follow houses like Sotheby’s or Christie’s. Hockney’s market is one of the most stable in the world because his appeal crosses generations.
Hockney’s legacy isn't just a bunch of pretty pictures. It’s a reminder that the world is actually quite beautiful if you bother to pay attention. He’s spent a lifetime proving that there is no such thing as a boring subject—only a boring way of looking at it. Whether he’s using a 16th-century technique or the latest tablet from Silicon Valley, the goal remains the same: to share the thrill of being alive and seeing clearly.