Chemical photography is on the way out. The West’s 500 year-old obsession with the photographic is coming to an end. Digital technology is bringing visual description closer to the hand, back to drawing and painting, and away from the impersonality of the camera lens.
This is the situation as Hockney sees it. His response was quintessentially brilliant, perverse and obsessive. He would delve 500 years back into art to demonstrate the ties that bind painting and photography together, ties so close we hardly know they exist, and ties that art historians were blind to. The project became a book and film called ‘Secret Knowledge’, and it filled up the two years that followed his mother’s death. This credo took Hockney back to the primacy of painting and drawing by hand. It was also responsible for the filming access David gave me up in Yorkshire, since my filming him at work would become a de facto demonstration of the superiority of painting over the photographic. A fine pickle!
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This video is an outtake from David Hockney: A Bigger Picture, an award-winning documentary by filmmaker Bruno Wollheim.
Watch the full film here: vimeo.com/onde...
Filmed over three years with unprecedented access, A Bigger Picture captures Britain’s most beloved painter at work. David Hockney’s return from California to paint the East Yorkshire landscape of his childhood - outside, in all weathers, through the seasons - culminates in the largest picture ever made outdoors. It’s an inspiring story of a painter in creative dialogue with nature and photography, and a revealing portrait of Britain’s most popular and celebrated artist.
“This wonderful film … will be of lasting importance for future generations who want to understand Hockney’s art.” Saturday Review, BBC Radio 4
“Bruno Wollheim’s portrait of this forthright magus is an unqualified, life-enhancing joy from start to finish.” - The Sunday Times
“This film may well be the best anyone will ever make about Hockney’s process.” - The Times, London.
“As gently hypnotic and fulfilling as one of Hockney’s own works.” - Time Out
“This impressive documentary is almost cinematic in its scope… both majestic and intimate” - The Observer
Watch the full documentary here: vimeo.com/2248...
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