David Hockney has been delighting and challenging audiences for almost sixty years. Working in an extraordinarily wide range of media with equal measures of wit and intelligence, his art has examined, probed and questioned how the perceived world of movement, space and time can be captured in two dimensions.



David Hockney has been delighting and challenging audiences for almost sixty years. Working in an extraordinarily wide range of media with equal measures of wit and intelligence, his art has examined, probed and questioned how the perceived world of movement, space and time can be captured in two dimensions. Now for the first time, a major retrospective at Tate Britain will give audiences the opportunity to explore Hockney’s entire career, and his achievements in painting, drawing, photography and video. Recent exhibitions have tended to focus on particular phases of Hockney’s career, or series of works, such as his landscapes or portraits. This exhibition will allow an overview of his constantly evolving style, and will explore his return to themes of special interest through his career, such as the effects of light, and experiments in perception. From abstract expressionism to naturalism to his play with illusion and imagination, parody and self-reflexivity, Hockney’s preoccupation with looking, perception and representation can be traced throughout. This fully illustrated publication reasserts Hockney as a serious thinker and a highly innovative artist constantly challenging the conventions of artistic expression, without losing the characteristic verve, humour and colour of the work. Showcasing over two hundred works (including painting, drawings, photographs, watercolours, the iPad drawings, and his most recent multi-screen works) from across the six decades of his remarkable career, this book will delight existing fans of the artist while giving new audiences the fullest possible introduction to his life and work.