{"id":1664404,"date":"2026-06-15T14:17:26","date_gmt":"2026-06-15T18:17:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/observer.com\/?p=1664404"},"modified":"2026-06-15T14:17:26","modified_gmt":"2026-06-15T18:17:26","slug":"death-david-hockney-artist-tribute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/observer.com\/2026\/06\/death-david-hockney-artist-tribute\/","title":{"rendered":"For David Hockney, Looking Was Living"},"content":{"rendered":"
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David Hockney at the Orangerie museum in Paris in 2021. THOMAS COEX\/AFP via Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The British have a term for people like David Hockney: national treasure. It’s an informal title reserved for people who achieve success so substantial that their name becomes synonymous with the nation’s identity. When Hockney died last week, both the Prime Minister and the King released statements praising his achievements and contributions to art. Hockney’s most famous paintings depict the swimming pools of California; later works show the changing light of Normandy over the course of a year. Yet he was born in Yorkshire, died in London and never lost his flat Northern accent. There was something else he never lost in his 88 years on earth: his love of looking and using whatever tool felt right to capture what he saw.<\/p>\n

Hockney was born in Bradford, an industrial town in the north of England, to a working-class family. His father upholstered prams, and when Hockney started painting street scenes of his native Bradford, he would lug his paints and equipment in one of his dad’s prams. It must have been a funny sight, but Hockney was not one to be embarrassed or snobbish when it came to anything, not least the tools of his trade. He embraced technology wherever it opened new creative possibilities, his curiosity keeping pace with every new development. His works encompass painting, photocopies, Polaroids and iPad drawings<\/a>. His methods of reproducing the world were not just a means to an end but an inspiration in themselves.<\/p>\n

As a student at the Royal College of Art, he was rebellious; he almost didn’t graduate when he refused to fulfill the essay-writing requirement of his degree, arguing that the work should be allowed to speak for itself. Hockney never wanted anyone to speak for him, nor did he want to censor himself in any way. He came out as gay while still a student, at a time when it was illegal to be homosexual in Britain. His signature looks\u2014the blues of Californian water, most clearly\u2014have long been part of queer visual culture. His was not an activist art; there’s no anger or stance, per se, other than an enjoyment of beauty and living how you want. Some of his early works were provocative\u2014a cheeky wink to viewers able to read queer desire between the lines. In Cleaning Teeth, Early Evening (10pm) W11<\/i> (1962), two men brush their teeth with Colgate toothpaste, but the positioning of the bodies and the phallic Colgate tubes is unmistakably sexual. A famous work from the year before is less provocative but no less enthralling. We Two Boys Together Clinging<\/i> at first looks crude, but the longer one looks, the more tender the work becomes. The title of the 1961 painting is borrowed from Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass<\/i>, an example of queer work inspiring later queer work, holding hands through time.<\/p>\n

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