‘We think winter is drab, but you’re just not looking for the colours. They are there.’ David Hockney at the Royal Academy

David Hockney: A Bigger Picture is big. Really big. The exhibition is a celebration of big paintings and big colours from bright blue trees to purple roads juxtaposed with beautiful pastel green grasses and autumnal reds. The RA invited Hockney to exhibit a selection of his recent work made between 2004 and 2011. After four decades living in California, Hockney returned to Yorkshire and has spent recent years turning his attention to the natural world, in particular his own Yorkshire landscape.

For an artist who made his name painting the seedy hot spots of Brooklyn and the sun drenched sun decks and pools of LA in the 1960s, the subject of this exhibition might at first seem a tad traditional for the iconic Pop artist. But this is landscape painting not how we know it. Colour, life and energy hit you when you look at the enormous paintings. Although Hockney has been inspired by classical landscape painting, his take on the landscape remains thoroughly fresh and innovative. His techniques vary from oil paint to iPad drawings. Even though some are gigantic in scale (created with the Gallery walls in mind), some seem personal, quiet and intimate.

Fifty-one iPad drawings – printed and shown consecutively – chart the seasonal approach of spring, and a series of films produced using 18 cameras shown on multiple screens at the end of the show are mesmerising.

Colour and celebration lie at the heart of this exhibition. The vibrant, suburban colours of Hockney’s LA poolsides have found their way into his Yorkshire landscapes. This is one of Scout London’s must see exhibition this season, and we are sure it will put a spring in your step.

David Hockney: A Bigger Picture
Royal Academy of Arts

21 January – 9 April 2012
Sunday – Thursday 10.00 – 18.00 (last admission to galleries 17.30)
Friday 10.00–22.00 (last admission to galleries 21.30)
Saturday 9.00 – 22.00 (last admission to galleries 21.30)
In the Main Galleries
Ticket Information
Underground: Green Park/Piccadilly Circus