My (abstracts) are representations, pictures of emotional situations.
It takes a long time for the gleam in the eye to turn into something solid
Sir Gordon Howard Eliot Hodgkin CH,
CBEThe Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(born 6 August 1932) is a
BritishThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
painterPainting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
and printmaker. His work is most often associated with
abstractionAbstract art uses a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th century, underpinned by the logic of perspective and an...
.
Early life
Hodgkin, a cousin of the English
still lifeA still life is a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which may be either natural or man-made...
painter
Eliot HodgkinEliot Hodgkin was an English painter, born in Purley Lodge, Purley-on-Thames near Pangbourne, Berkshire.Although he began with oil painting, most of his finest works were in tempera, specializing in highly detailed still lifes....
(1905–87), was educated at
Bryanston SchoolBryanston School is a co-educational independent school for both day and boarding pupils in Blandford, north Dorset, England, near the village of Bryanston. It was founded in 1928...
in
DorsetDorset , is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The county town is Dorchester which is situated in the south. The Hampshire towns of Bournemouth and Christchurch joined the county with the reorganisation of local government in 1974...
. He then studied at the
Camberwell Art SchoolCamberwell College of Arts is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London, and is widely regarded as one of the world's foremost art and design institutions. It is located in Camberwell, South London, England, with two sites situated at Peckham Road and Wilson Road...
and later at the Bath Academy of Art in
CorshamCorsham is a historic market town and civil parish in north west Wiltshire, England. It is at the south western extreme of the Cotswolds, just off the A4 which was formerly the main turnpike road from London to Bristol, between Bath and Chippenham ....
, where
Edward PiperEdward Blake Christmas Piper was an English painter.Edward Piper was the eldest son of the artist John Piper and his wife Myfanwy. He was educated at Lancing College and later studied under Howard Hodgkin at the Bath Academy of Art in Corsham and later at the Slade School in London.He produced...
studied drawing under him.
Early work
Hodgkin's first solo show was in
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
in 1962. His early
paintingPainting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
s tend to be made up of
hard-edgedHard-edge painting is painting in which abrupt transitions are found between color areas. Color areas are often of one unvarying color. The Hard-edge painting style is related to Geometric abstraction, Op Art, Post-painterly Abstraction, and Color Field painting.-History of the term:The term was...
curved forms in a limited number of colours.
Mature work
Around the beginning of the 1970s, his style became more spontaneous, with vaguely recognisable shapes presented in bright colours and bold forms. His works may then be called
"semi-abstract"Abstract art uses a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th century, underpinned by the logic of perspective and an...
, and are often compared to the paintings of
Henri MatisseHenri Matisse was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter...
.
In 1984, Hodgkin represented
BritainThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
at the
Venice BiennaleThe Venice Biennale is a major contemporary art exhibition that takes place once every two years in Venice, Italy. The Venice Film Festival is part of it. So too is the Venice Biennale of Architecture, which is held in even years...
, in 1985 he won the
Turner PrizeThe Turner Prize, named after the painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist under the age of 50. Awarding the prize is organised by the Tate gallery and staged at Tate Britain. Since its beginnings in 1984 it has become the United Kingdom's most publicised...
, and in 1992 he was
knightA knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior....
ed.
In 1995, Hodgkin printed the
Venetian Views series, which depict the same view of Venice at four different times of day.
Venice, Afternoon - one of the four prints - uses sixteen sheets, or fragments, in a hugely complex printing process which creates a colourful, painterly effect. This piece was given to the Yale Centre of British Art in June 2006 by the Israel family to complement their already-impressive collection of Hodgkins.
In 2003 he was appointed by
Queen Elizabeth IIElizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
as a Companion of Honour. A major exhibition of his work was mounted at
Tate BritainTate Britain is an art gallery situated on Millbank in London, and part of the Tate gallery network in Britain, with Tate Modern, Tate Liverpool and Tate St Ives. It is the oldest gallery in the network, opening in 1897. It houses a substantial collection of the works of J. M. W. Turner.-History:It...
,
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, in 2006. Also in 2006,
The IndependentThe Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
declared him one of the 100 most influential gay people in Britain, as his work helps many people express their emotions to others.
In September 2010 Hodgkin and five other British artists including
John HoylandJohn Hoyland RA was a London-based British artist. He was one of the country's leading abstract painters.-Life:...
,
John WalkerJohn Walker is an English painter and printmaker.Walker studied in Birmingham. Some of his early work was inspired by abstract expressionism and post-painterly abstraction, and often combined apparently three-dimensional shapes with "flatter" elements...
,
Ian StephensonIan Stephenson was an English abstract artist. Stephenson trained at King's College, Durham along with Noel Forster and had his first solo show in London at the New Vision Centre in 1958...
,
Patrick CaulfieldPatrick Joseph Caulfield, CBE, RA was an English painter and printmaker known for his bold canvases, which often incorporated elements of Photorealism within a pared down scene.-Life and work:...
and R.B. Kitaj were included in an exhibition entitled
The Independent Eye: Contemporary British Art From the Collection of Samuel and Gabrielle Lurie, at the
Yale Center for British ArtThe Yale Center for British Art is an art museum in New Haven, Connecticut at Yale University which houses the most comprehensive collection of British Art outside the United Kingdom...
.
Style
Hodgkin's paintings often seek to convey memories of encounters with friends and frequently carry titles alluding to specific places and events such as
Dinner at West Hill (1966) and
Goodbye to the Bay of Naples (1980–82). Hodgkin himself has said that he paints "representational pictures of emotional situations," a statement that fixes him firmly as an advocate of the expressionist movement. Hodgkin's appeal to representationalism prevents his categorization as an abstract expressionist - although some artists within that movement do execute representational paintings that are consumed into the expressionistic vortex of their particular psychodrama. As a formidable expressionist, Hodgkin occupies a lonely space somewhere between the incandescent impressions of Turner; the powerful emotional explosiveness of Van Gogh and the colder abstractions of Pollock, De Kooning and the late canvases of Kline.
Despite their apparent spontaneity and usually small scale, many of Hodgkin's paintings take years to complete, with the artist returning to a work after a wait and then changing it or adding to it. He often paints over the frames of his pictures, emphasising the idea of the painting as an object. Several of his works are on wooden items, such as bread-boards or the tops of old tables, rather than
canvasCanvas is an extremely heavy-duty plain-woven fabric used for making sails, tents, marquees, backpacks, and other items for which sturdiness is required. It is also popularly used by artists as a painting surface, typically stretched across a wooden frame...
. A number of his works not shown in frames are surrounded by rectangles of simple colour.
His prints are hand-painted etchings and he has worked with the same master printer (Jack Shirreff at 107 Workshop) and print publisher (Alan Cristea Gallery) for the last 25 years.
Further reading
- Hollinghurst, Alan. (2008). Howard Hodgkin. Gagosian Gallery
Gagosian Gallery is a contemporary art gallery owned and directed by Larry Gagosian. There are currently eleven gallery spaces: three in New York; two in London; one in each of Beverly Hills, Rome, Athens, Paris, Geneva, Hong Kong and Moscow.-1980s:...
. ISBN 1932598715
External links