David Hockney (born 9 July 1937) is an English painter, draftsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer. As an important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists of the 20th century.
While at the Royal College of Art, Hockney featured in the exhibition Young Contemporaries – alongside Peter Blake – that announced the arrival of British Pop art. He was associated with the movement, but his early works display expressionist elements, similar to some works by Francis Bacon.
Hockney moved to Los Angeles in 1964, where he was inspired to make a series of paintings of swimming pools in the comparatively new acrylic medium using vibrant colours. Hockney has also experimented with painting, drawing, printmaking, watercolours, photography, and many other media including a fax machine, paper pulp, computer applications and iPad drawing programs.
Hockney has always returned to painting portraits throughout his career. he painted portraits and double portraits of friends, lovers, and relatives just under life-size in a realistic style that adroitly captured the likenesses of his subjects.
-Joiners-
In the early 1980s, Hockney began to produce photo collages —which in his early explorations within his personal photo albums he referred to as “joiners” first using Polaroid prints and 35mm, commercially processed colour prints. Using Polaroid snaps or photolab-prints of a single subject, Hockney arranged a patchwork to make a composite image.
Creation of the “joiners” occurred accidentally. He noticed in the late sixties that photographers were using cameras with wide-angle lenses. He did not like these photographs because they looked somewhat distorted. While working on a painting of a living room and terrace in Los Angeles, he took Polaroid shots of the living room and glued them together, not intending for them to be a composition on their own. On looking at the final composition, he realised it created a narrative, as if the viewer moved through the room.
During the summer it is important that you keep training your eye and practice making images. Below are two tasks: MY ROCK (photo-assignment) and another MY FAMILY (research) that you can work on during the summer break which will prepare you for the next academic year in September.
The images you produce here will be part of our next phase of our project when we begin to explore narrative and make a 16 page photo-zine in September.
PHOTO-ASSIGNMENT – MY ROCK: Select one bay or geological site of special of interest (SSI) in Jersey and explore it with your camera throughout the summer. DEADLINE: 6 Sept – first day of new academic term
Geological sites could include dolmens and other neolithic structures, such as La Cotte in St Brelade. Bays could include rocks, coastline and mythologial sites, such as Devil’s Hole (see resources for more sites linked to Jersey legends, myths and folklore below).
IMAGES: explore the following
Landscape & views: rock formations along the coastline set against wider natural environments
Shapes & Form: Look for interesting granite that you may frame as rock face
Abstract & close-up: move in closer and look for textures/ patterns/ colourisation/ surfaces/ repetition within granite.
Photo-collaging: produce a series of images that overlap each other to form a much wider and detailed picture. (See Hockney and Allchurch for inspiration)
Narrative: Consider how to tell a story about your site and produce a sequence of images. For example, consider Jersey myth, legends and folklore as part of the meaning behind your photo-shoots. You can incorporate elements of staging and include people and props to develop a specific narrative.
Still-life: Collect at least 5 different objects/ debris (natural/ man-made) from your site and photograph as object in-situ and also create a mini-studio at home using black/white paper or other materials as a backdrop. Bring these objects to class when we return in September too.
BLOG > PHOTO-ASSIGNMENT
Publish all your work on the blog before returning to school on Tue 6 September. Best of luck and have a great summer!
Produce at least 3-5 photo-shoots!
Review and evaluate your shoots as they develop
Identity weaknesses and strength
Plan and re-visit for a new shoot that adds value to what you already have.
Make sure you collect 5 objects from your shoots that you photograph as still-life and bring to class in September
You have to ask yourself: Am I satisfied that I have enough images/ material? What are you going to do differently on next shoot? How are you going to develop your ideas?
These images could become starting point for your Personal Study that we will develop later in the autumn term You could produce another photo-zine based on this summer project and any work that you produce will be assessed as part of your Personal Investigation (coursework) awarding you marks based on skills, knowledge and understanding of photography as a tool for communication in narrative, sequence and design.
INSPIRATIONS – ideas, styles, aesthetics
Here is a selection of images made by Matt Brown last year as part of his Personal Study: Bouley Bay.
Have a look at his blog here for more ideas around his research, artists inspirations and further experimentation.
Megan Woolsgrove and her project on Green Island: La Motte Here is an online link to her photobook: La Motte: Walking through Landscapes and Archives. Go to her blog here for more context, research, artists references, experimentation etc.
Inspiration was Anna Atkins photobook: Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions 1843-53
The first book to be photographically printed and illustrated, Photographs of British Algae was published in fascicles beginning in 1843 and is a landmark in the history of photography. Using specimens she collected herself or received from other amateur scientists, Atkins made the plates by placing wet algae directly on light-sensitized paper and exposing the paper to sunlight. In the 1840s, the study of algae was just beginning to be systematized in Britain, and Atkins based her nomenclature on William Harvey’s unillustrated Manual of British Algae (1841), labeling each plate in her own hand. Read more here
Beliefs and superstitions revolving around mythical characters in Jersey, Channel Island are common. The ancient lanes overhung with vegetation look almost like dark tunnels leading into the unknown. Unexplained ruins dotted around the coast add to the air of mystery and Island people with a long and proud history have many stories to tell which have been passed down from generation to generation. In this photo book I have explored three of Jerseys most famous and well-known legends, portraying each one with a series of environmental portraits, studio shots and landscape photographs. The first legend tells the story of the poor Bride of Waterworks Valley, the second shows the demonic presence down at Devil’s Hole and the third looks into the many tales of Witchcraft in Jersey. This project is my response to the provided themes of ‘truth, fantasy and fiction’, as well as the beautiful depictions of myths created by other photographers. My aim for this photo book was to recreate some of our islands most interesting history using beautiful and insightful visuals. By doing this I hope to bring these legends back to life in this colourful yet ominous series.
Legend says that a terrible dragon once lived in Jersey, killing people and burning houses all over the Island. The noble Sir Hambye of France heard stories of this dragon; he travelled to Jersey and cut the dragon’s head off!
As an island, Jersey’s culture, identity and history have all been moulded by the ocean. As such, it is no surprise that a lot of Jersey’s myths and legends take place on the Island’s coastline. Six of these tales are illustrated on this set of stamps, including:
Some fairies were associated with the home, but more often they were connected with the landscape, especially with features that seemed mysterious, like mounds and caves.
Many explanations have been given for the belief in fairies. Some thought they were supernatural creatures, like ghosts or spirits of the dead. Others described them as fallen angels. The oldest fairies on record were described by historian Gervase of Tilbury in the 13th century. He wrote a collection of legends and marvels that included stories of fairy creatures and apparitions ‘from a parallel world’.
Similar studies have been made into Jersey folklore that explore the important links between local myths, the Jèrriais language and place names. Jersey Place Names, by Charles Stevens, Jean Arthur, Joan Stevens and Collette Stevens, meticulously records and analyses place names cross the Island and includes several references to fairies and other supernatural creatures.
Before we developed an understanding of our prehistoric ancestors, Jersey’s many ancient dolmens and standing stones were associated with fairies and goblins, and for many people they still hold a powerful mystical quality. For example, La Pouquelaye means a goblin’s path or stone, and is used to describe a dolmen or other megalithic structure. The name appears connected with various roads and fields in the La Pouquelaye area to the north of St Helier. Faldouet dolmen, or La Pouquelaye de Faldouet, stands on Rue de Pouclée, and the variants of ‘pouquelaye’/ ‘pouclée’ also appear in field names in St Ouen and Trinity.
Other sites with fairy associations in their place names include La Cotte de St Brelade, one of Jersey’s most important archaeological sites. In Jèrriais it has been known as La Cave à la Fée a Ouiné (The Fairy Cave at Ouaisné). In St Clement the site of the well-known legend of the witches, an unusual outcrop of rock at Rocqueberg, is also known as Le Rocher des Fées (The Fairies’ Rock). The area around the impressive dolmen at Grantez in St Ouen has been known variously as Le Creux de Faitieaux, Les Petits Faîtchieaux and Le Mont ès Faitieaux (meaning fairy folk). These prehistoric sites were widely believed to have been built by the fairies and historian Giles Bois records that when the Société Jersiaise excavated the dolmen at Grantez in 1912, an elderly man from the parish challenged the workmen with the words: ‘Tchi sacrilège! Mais qu’ou éthez êticbotchi les faîtchieaux ous allez nouos emm’ner tchique dro sus l’vaîsinné!’ This translates as: ‘Such sacrilege! But if you have disturbed the fairies you’ll have brought such trouble on the neighbourhood!’ Here are some examples of the stories:
The Lavoir des Dames, St John. Hidden within the rocks at Sorel Point is a rectangular pool called Le Lavoir des Dames. In local folklore, any man who saw the fairies bathing there would be struck blind immediately.
St Brelade’s Church. Legend has it that when the church was built, all the necessary materials were collected together at the chosen site in preparation but the next day there was no sign of anything. The items were eventually found almost a mile away near the sea. The workmen moved the materials back again, only to find that the same thing happened the next day. They are said to have accepted this as the will of God and built the church where it is today. Explanations for the change of site include that the original site chosen by the builders was near a pagan shrine and the fairies didn’t want a church on their doorstep. Others said the devil was pleased to get the church built so far from the homes of most of the parishioners. Another explanation given was that God wanted the church walls to be washed by the sea and chose the lovely location where the church still stands.
Les Rouaux (La Belle Hougue Point), Trinity. Near Les Rouaux is a spring known as La Fontaine des Mittes. According to folklore, this spring could give sight to the blind and restore the hearing of the deaf. The guardian spirits of fountains and streams were called the naiads and people believed that they had powers of good and evil. Two of these nymphs, Arna and Aiûna, are said to have lived in a grotto at La Belle Hougue Point. One autumn evening, near the end of their joyful and peaceful life on earth, an angel guided them to a home beyond the stars. As Arna and Aiûna rose they were reminded of their happy time on earth and cried a tear of sadness from each eye. These pure drops of water could not be received by the ground and so became a spring with healing properties.
Belief in witchcraft was formerly strong in Jersey, and survived in country areas well into the 20th century. Witches were supposed to hold their sabbats on Fridays at Rocqueberg, the Witches’ Rock, in St Clement. Folklore preserves a belief that witches’ stones on old houses were resting places for witches flying to their meetings.
La Fête Nouormande: Every third year Jersey hosts La fête Nouormande, a folk festival centering on the Norman culture and heritage of the island, which attracts performers and visitors from Guernsey and the continent.
Dragon of La Hougue Bie: Legend says that a terrible dragon once lived in St. Lawrence, killing people and burning houses all over the Island. The noble Sir Hambye of France heard stories of this dragon; he travelled to Jersey and cut the dragon’s head off! Exhausted and wounded from the battle, Sir Hambye lay down to rest, watched over by his trusty squire. What Sir Hambye didn’t know was that his squire wasn’t loyal or trustworthy at all. The squire wanted all the glory for himself – he killed his master whilst he was resting then buried the body before returning to France. He told Sir Hambye’s wife that his master had been killed by the dragon and that he, the Squire, had avenged his death by killing the dragon. He also added that the dying wish of Sir Hambye was that the Squire should marry his Lady wife. What a terrible thing to do! One night after they were married, the Lady overheard the squire talking in his sleep, he admitted killing his master back in Jersey. The Lady had the Squire sent to trial where he confessed to killing Sir Hambye, and was sentenced to death. In memory of her husband, the lady travelled to Jersey and built the mound here at La Hougue Bie. On a clear day you can see right across to France.
The Black Dog of Bouley Bay: Many years ago in Trinity, people talked of a black dog that was the size of a bull with enormous red eyes that glowed like fire. He would walk the cliff paths around Bouley Bay at night, dragging its chain behind him. There were many rumours of the Black Dog, some said a sighting of him meant a storm was coming, where as others said he led lost travellers to safety. Others said that the Black Dog would chase people to scare them, but he would never hurt them. It is said that the Black Dog of Bouley Bay was a myth made up by smugglers to keep people away from the Bay at night so they could steal from Jersey without people noticing, but this was never confirmed as a dog’s howl was heard every night coming from the Bay. It is still said now that if you see the ghost of the Black Dog at Bouley Bay, it is a sign that a storm is coming your way.
The Rock in Bonne Nuit Bay: Once there was a beautiful, young woman named Anne-Marie who liked to skim stones on the beach at Bonne Nuit. One day, a sea-sprite noticed her, and as he watched her, he decided that he wanted Anne-Marie for his wife. But Anne-Marie had a sweetheart called William who worked at the stables nearby. The sea-sprite became so jealous that he decided to get rid of William and have Anne-Marie for himself. The next day William went to muck out the stable, and inside he found a splendid white stallion. Shocked, but pleased at such a gift, he decided he would ride it to show Anne-Marie. That night however, William dreamt that the stallion was dangerous, so he picked some mistletoe and took it with him when he went riding. As he rode across the beach towards Anne-Marie, the stallion turned and began to charge towards the sea – it was the sea-sprite in disguise, trying to drown him. William beat the stallion about the head with the mistletoe, and all of a sudden the horse stiffened and turned into rock. You can still see the rock in Bonne Nuit Bay.
The Faithful Black Horse: Long ago, Jersey was ruled by French soldiers. many islanders did not like the French rule, especially Philippe de Carteret, the Seigneur of St Ouen. As the French soldiera didn’t want Philippe causing trouble, they decided to kidnap him. Whilst Philippe was fishing in St. Ouen’s pond, the French soldiers crept along to capture him, but Philippe saw them, and leapt on his black horse. He raced towards his manor, but the soldiers cut him off. He turned into Val de la Charriere, but there was only one way out – across a deep wide ditch. His horse bravely jumped it, and just landed on the other side, and so Philippe continued towards home. Once he reached home, and was safe, his faithful horse collapsed and died. Philippe ordered that his horse be buried in his garden, and today you can see a painting of the black horse in St. Ouen’s Manor.
Witches’ Rock: Legend tells us of a fisherman called Hubert who was engaged to a woman called Madeleine. He used to go for long walks during the evenings after work, and one evening he walked towards Rocqueberg Point. He fell asleep next to the rock, but when he awoke the rock had gone – and was replaced by a magic wood with beautiful girls dancing round the trees. Hubert danced with them, and as he left he promised he would return the following night. When he got home, he told Madeleine about the strange events, and she warned him not to go the next night, but Hubert decided to go anyway. Madeleine told the parish priest about her suspicions, and the priest told her to take a crucifix and follow Hubert to Rocqueberg Point that night. When Madeleine reached Rocqueberg, she saw Hubert, merrily dancing, but there were no beautiful girls – just ugly old witches. Madeleine held the crucifix high above her head and ran towards the witches – who vanished, shrieking. Hubert collapsed, and the rock returned in place of the magical forest. Since that night the rock has been called Witches’ Rock.
MY FAMILY: Explore your own private archives such as photo-albums, home movies, diaries, letters, birth-certificates, boxes, objects, mobile devices, online/ social media platforms and make a blog post with a selection of material that can be used for further development and experimentation using a variety of re-staging or montage techniques .
Archives can be a rich source for finding starting points on your creative journey. This will strengthen your research and lead towards discoveries about the past that will inform the way you interpret the present and anticipate the future. See more Public/ Private Archives
For example, you can focus on the life on one parent, grand-parent, family relative, or your own childhood and upbringing. Ask other family members (parents, grand-parents, aunties, uncles) if you can look through their photo-albums too etc.
Family photo-albumsDigital images stored on mobile phones, uploaded on social media etc.
TASKS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE:
Either scan or re-photograph archival material so that it is digitised and ready for use on the blog and further experimentation.
Plan at least one photo-shoot and make a set of images that respond to your archival research. This can be re-staging old photos or make a similar set of images, eg. portraits of family members and how they have changed over the years, or snapshots of social and family gatherings.
Choose one of your images which relates to the theme of family (e.g. archive, family album, or new image you have made) and destroy the same image in 5 different ways using both analogue and digital method techniques. Eg. Reprint old and new photos and combine using scissors/ tearing and glue/ tape. In Photoshop use a variety of creative tools to cut and paste fragments of images to create composites.
Produce appropriate blogposts with both family research, archival material and new photographic responses and experiments.
Extension: Choose a second image and destroy it in 5 new or other ways.
cof
Under Oath, 2017
Jonny Briggs: In search of lost parts of my childhood I try to think outside the reality I was socialised into and create new ones with my parents and self. Through these I use photography to explore my relationship with deception, the constructed reality of the family, and question the boundaries between my parents and I, between child/adult, self/other, nature/culture, real/fake in attempt to revive my unconditioned self, beyond the family bubble. Although easily assumed to be photoshopped or faked, upon closer inspection the images are often realised to be more real than first expected. Involving staged installations, the cartoonesque and the performative, I look back to my younger self and attempt to re-capture childhood nature through my assuming adult eyes.
Thomas Sauvin and Kensuke Koike: ‘No More, No Less’ In 2015, French artist Thomas Sauvin acquired an album produced in the early 1980s by an unknown Shanghai University photography student. This volume was given a second life through the expert hands of Kensuke Koike, a Japanese artist based in Venice whose practice combines collage and found photography. The series, “No More, No Less”, born from the encounter between Koike and Sauvin, includes new silver prints made from the album’s original negatives. These prints were then submitted to Koike’s sharp imagination, who, with a simple blade and adhesive tape, deconstructs and reinvents the images. However, these purely manual interventions all respect one single formal rule: nothing is removed, nothing is added, “No More, No Less”. In such a context that blends freedom and constraint, Koike and Sauvin meticulously explore the possibilities of an image only made up of itself.
Veronica GesickaTraces presents a selection of photomontages created by Weronika Gęsicka on the basis of American stock photographs from the 1950s and 1960s. Family scenes, holiday memories, everyday life – all of that suspended somewhere between truth and fiction. The images, modified by Gęsicka in various ways, are wrapped in a new context: our memories of the people and situations are transformed and blur gradually. Humorous as they may seem, Gęsicka’s works are a comment on such fundamental matters as identity, self-consciousness, relationships, imperfection.
Mask XIV 2006
John Stezaker: Is a British artist who is fascinated by the lure of images. Taking classic movie stills, vintage postcards and book illustrations, Stezaker makes collages to give old images a new meaning. By adjusting, inverting and slicing separate pictures together to create unique new works of art, Stezaker explores the subversive force of found images. Stezaker’s famous Mask series fuses the profiles of glamorous sitters with caves, hamlets, or waterfalls, making for images of eerie beauty.
His ‘Dark Star’ series turns publicity portraits into cut-out silhouettes, creating an ambiguous presence in the place of the absent celebrity. Stezaker’s way of giving old images a new context reaches its height in the found images of his Third Person Archive: the artist has removed delicate, haunting figures from the margins of obsolete travel illustrations. Presented as images on their own, they now take the centre stage of our attention
There are different ways artists and photographers have explored their own, or other families in their work as visual storytellers. Some explore family using a documentary approach to storytelling, others construct or stage images that may reflect on their childhood, memories, or significant events drawing inspiration from family archives/ photo albums and often incorporating vernacular images into the narrative and presenting the work as a photobook.
Rita Puig-Serra Costa (Where Mimosa Bloom) vs Laia Abril (The Epilogue)> artists exploring personal issues > vernacular vs archival > inside vs outside
Rita Puig-Serra Coasta, Where Mimosa BloomLaia Abril, The Epiloque
Carole Benitah (Photo Souvenirs) vs Diane Markosian (Inventing My Father) > family > identity > memory > absence > trauma
Carole Benitah, Photo-SouvenirsThis is the closet thing I had to an image of my father. A cut out of him in my mother’s photo album.
Ugne Henriko (Mother and Daughter) vs Irina Werning or Chino Otsuka > re-staging images > re-enacting memories
out of 701 images I took on the trip then used the star ratings to find only the good images then I kept refining to find my best images.
these images are my best 19 I selected from that photoshoot.
I increased the contrast and decreased the highlights to give more depth to the image. I did this to give better distinguish between the rock, the moss and the grass. decreasing the highlights bring more contrast into the sky giving it slightly less overcast effect.
i liked the way the light Shon down into the craves so I put it in black and white to give better contrast between the two tones light and dark. I then used the graduated filter tool to make the bottom of the image darkest so that it slowly fades from over exposed white at the top shining down until complete darkness at the bottom.
This photo was taken from above looking down into the crease I increased the vibrance to bring out the bright yellows in the lichen. increased the shadows to create the effect of a deep dark crevasse.
I liked the reflection in the water so I decided to put the image into black and white to create a distinct contrast. this contrast gives a more mysteries effect because the oyster catcher is facing with its back to the lens.
For my first experimentation, which I will do in the style of David Hockney, I will use the photos which I took during the photoshoot in L’Etacq. I began by selecting the images which I took to create a joiner and began by adjusting the settings of one image and this is where I was able to fix the lighting where it may be slightly overexposed, define the details of the rocks and turn into black and white.
After editing one photo, I then selected all the other images which I will use and selected the ‘Sync Settings’ button which applied all of the edited settings from the first image to the others, which you can see ticked in the boxes above, so that when I create the joiner on photoshop they will all look similar and this will help them to work well together as they will all be synchronised.
Here is all of the 20 images which I will use for my joiner having the applied settings from the first image to them. I think that these came out quite successful as the smaller details of the rocks are defined, which I wanted to do as it will add a layer of depth into the joiner and the contrast of the black and white filter helps this effect too. I then made a ‘joiner’ folder in Adobe Lightroom which helped me to organise them clearly, and exported them into a folder on the media drive so that I can access them easily when I go to create the joiner on photoshop.
Once in photoshop, I chose ‘File’ then ‘Automate’ and then ‘Photomerge’ where I select all the images which I placed into a folder beforehand as it makes my work more organised. After selecting the 20 images which I will use, I selected the normal joiner effect from the selection there was and then Adobe Photoshop begins to put the photos together.
After it has loaded, this is what is created and I think that the computer wasn’t able to locate where the photos at the top are supposed to go as they are quite detailed that is why they have been placed at top. When making my next few examples of experimentation of joiners in different ways, I will consider what photos I will use more and make sure there is a clear link between them so that they can be joined together on the computer easier.
More examples of joiners –
I repeated the process above to create these joiners with a different selection of pictures in black and white and colour, I was also able to select different options for the way the joiner turned out, such as: adding a background colour, changing it into a 3D effect and changing the depth/perspective.
1)
2)
3)
4)
Images to use for exhibition –
These are the two images which I have chosen to be a part of the exhibition ‘My Rock’ that is taking place for the Link Gallery at the Jersey Museum. I edited these two images beforehand on Adobe Lightroom then brought them into Photoshop. This is where I was able to transform the top photo, of a rockface, into a joiner then use a ‘Mesh Pre-set’ of Sphere, which I really like as it can resemble a snow globe which are used to represent different places and their scenery. Then for the photo below of a morphed rockface I used a ‘Depth Map’ which distort the photo into a sphere which has all different angles from the photos which I have used. I liked this pre-set depth map because it is unusually shaped and if you saw the photo before it was transformed you would be able to see the different aspects of the photo.
In order to create my joiners, I began by looking through all of my photos and giving them a colour label of blue or purple, I used blue to label the photos that are in focus and purple to label the blurrier image. I did this to make it easy to differentiate the photos I wanted to turn into joiners from my other images.
Contact Sheet
I then edited an image per joiner and used the ‘sync settings’ tool on Lightroom to ensure all the photos in each joiner would be edited the same way, therefore making each joiner have the same look. This ensured that each photo within the joiners wouldn’t be overexposed and would be ready to export into photoshop.
Contact Sheet
Making My Joiners
Some of my experiments did not go well as photoshop separated my photos into different mini joiners instead of creating one full landscape. However, I did managed to make some successful joiners which I like after being more selective with my images.
A not so good experiment
A not so good experiment
A successful joiner
A successful joiner
Using the previous joiner, I decided to expand upon it by increasing/decreasing the brightness of certain parts of the joiner to make it more visually interesting
A successful joiner that I decided to add a drop shadow to
3d Experiments:
I decided to make some 3D experiments using photoshop using their 3D options which included making spherical panoramas, making mesh presets and making depth maps in order to make my joiners to look more interesting.
—– Experimenting with one joiner: ——————————–
My Original Joiner
My joiner as a hat
My joiner with a lot of depth
My joiner curved into a spherical panorama
—– Experimenting with another joiner: ——————————–
My Original Joiner
My joiner as a sphere
My joiner with a lot of depth
My joiner with a pattern overlay
My joiner curved into a spherical panorama
My joiner as a sphere with the original joiner in the background
David Hockney (born 9 July 1937) is an English painter, draftsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer. As an important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists of the 20th century.
On 15 November 2018, Hockney’s 1972 work Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures) sold at Christie’s auction house in New York City for $90 million (£70 million), becoming the most expensive artwork by a living artist sold at auction. This broke the previous record, set by the 2013 sale of Jeff Koons’ Balloon Dog (Orange) for $58.4 million. Hockney held this record until 15 May 2019 when Koons reclaimed the honour selling his Rabbit for more than $91 million at Christie’s in New York.
Joiners
David Hockney’s creation of the “joiners” occurred accidentally. He noticed in the late sixties that photographers were using cameras with wide-angle lenses to take pictures. He did not like such photographs because they always came out somewhat distorted. Working on a painting of a living room and terrace in Los Angeles, he took Polaroid shots of the living room and glued them together as a preparatory work, not intending for them to be a composition on their own. He realised this picture created a kind of story, as if the viewer was moving through the room. He began to work more and more with photography after this discovery and even stopped painting for a period of time. Hockney had always been interested in Cubism and the idea of multiple perspectives and viewpoints so this was another way for him to explore this way of looking.
Emily Allchurch
Emily Allchurch, born 1974 in Jersey, Channel Islands, lives and works in Hastings, East Sussex. She trained as a sculptor, receiving a First Class (Hons.) degree in Fine Art from the Kent Institute of Art & Design – Canterbury in 1996, and an MA from the Royal College of Art in 1999, where she began working with photography as a material. Since then, she has exhibited regularly in solo and group shows in the UK and internationally.
Allchurch uses photography and digital collage to reconstruct Old Master paintings and prints to create contemporary narratives. Her starting point is an intensive encounter with a city or place, to absorb an impression and gather a huge image library. From this resource, hundreds of photographs are selected and meticulously spliced together to create a seamless new ‘fictional’ space. Each artwork re-presents this journey, compressed into a single scene. The resulting photographic collages have a resonance with place, history and culture, and deal with the passage of time and the changes to a landscape, fusing contemporary life with a sense of history.
Below are contact sheets from the class trip to L’etacq. After importing them into lightroom, I used the P and X tools to filter out images that I didn’t think were as successful.
I found, when taking images inside a cave at low tide, my images were overexposed. This was because the light was streaming into the cave from above, which caused very bright images.
When selecting images, especially in this shoot, I was looking for clear and well composed images. This was especially important with the rural landscapes in this shoot, as I wanted different elements of rock to be included well in each image.
Here I have selected in yellow and red my images for my joiners, in order to separate these from my normal photos.
Best Images
Below are my best images, edited using Abode Lightroom.
I chose this image as one of my best images due to the strong leading lines and balanced composition. The leading lines take the eye from the middle of the image upwards to the left middle and top of the hill. I also like the different textures and tones within this image (enhanced by my editing), such as the different green tones of grass and vegetation, and different types of rock.
I chose this image as one of my final images due to the different textures and shadows on the rock face. I think editing in black and white helped to enhance these features was very effective, as the added contrast helped to increase the darker tones in the crevices of the rocks.
I like the interesting composition in this image, as well as the deep and moody tones. I like the composition in this image because of the three parts that are each distinctly different – to the left there is a small rock with vegetation, the right a more intense, orange rock, and finally to the right in the foreground a grey rock with little vegetation. These parts act as a frame for the other parts of the image, for example the whitewash at the bottom of the cliffs, which becomes a natural focal point.
Here I produced two different versions of one image – a black and white edit and one in colour. I think that producing two edits for this image was a good idea as in black and white, the crevices and details of the rock are more prominent than in colour, due to the high levels of contrast and texture. However, in colour (below) I think this image works well as it shows the different variations of colour and texture in the whole image – the grass, the rock, the sky, and the sea. Whereas, in the black and white image, the darkness of the rock kind of takes over the whole image more, making the other parts more insignificant.
Evaluation
What went well: In this shoot, I think I produced some well composed images. I didn’t deal with much over exposure, except when shooting in the caves. I changed my settings especially for the location before I started my shoot which really helped with this.
What I could do better: If I was to do this shoot again, I would maybe shoot the caves on a darker day, to ensure the exposure was balanced in those images. Furthermore, I would make sure to hold my camera steady, or even use a tripod like David Hockney, to take my joiner images, as quite a few of them came out blurry. This was because I was taking so many images so quickly. Next time I take joiners, I will take my time more when taking the images to achieve clearer, more successful images for my joiner.
David Hockney (born 9 July 1937) is an English painter, draftsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer. As an important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists of the 20th century.
Hockney has owned residences and studios in Bridlington, and London, as well as two residences in California, where he has lived intermittently since 1964: one in the Hollywood Hills, one in Malibu, and an office and archives on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood, California. On 15 November 2018, Hockney’s 1972 work Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures) was sold at Christie’s auction house in New York City for $90 million (£70 million), becoming the most expensive artwork by a living artist sold at auction. This broke the previous record, set by the 2013 sale of Jeff Koons’ Balloon Dog (Orange) for $58.4 million. Hockney held this record until 15 May 2019 when Koons reclaimed the honour of selling his Rabbit for more than $91 million at Christie’s in New York.
David Hockney
Hockney was born in Bradford, England, on July 9, 1937. He loved books and was interested in art from an early age, admiring Picasso, Matisse and Fragonard. His parents encouraged their son’s artistic exploration and gave him the freedom to doodle and daydream. Hockney attended the Bradford College of Art from 1953 to 1957. Then, because he was a conscientious objector to military service, he spent two years working in hospitals to fulfil his national service requirement. In 1959, he entered graduate school at the Royal College of Art in London alongside other young artists such as Peter Blake and Allen Jones. He experimented with different forms, including abstract expressionism.
One of David Hockney’s early works “we 2 boys clinging together”
He did well as a student, and his paintings won prizes and were purchased for private collections. In addition to pools, Hockney painted the interiors and exteriors of California homes. In 1970, this led to the creation of his first “joiner,” an assemblage of Polaroid photos laid out in a grid. Although this medium would become one of his claims to fame, he stumbled upon it by accident. While working on a painting of a Los Angeles living room, he took a series of photos for his reference and fixed them together so he could paint from the image. When he finished, however, he recognised the collage as an art form unto itself and began to create more.
A video on the life of David Hockney
Joiners
During the early 80’s Hockney began to create ‘joiners’, now they are photo collages. When he first began to produce these he did them with Polaroid prints and later on he did them with 35mm, commercially processed prints. He created joiners by taking multiple and varying Polaroid shots or photo lab prints of just an individual subject. Then with these shots, he would arrange them into what almost looks like a patchwork, to create an overall image. One of Hockney’s first ‘joiners’ was a photomontage of his mother. A big aim for Cubist feel, he established this through taking shots at different perspectives and at different times. His work ranges from Landscape, Pearblossom Highway #2 to portraits, Kasmin 1982, and My Mother, Bolton Abbey, 1982.
This is one of Hockney’s most famous Joiners of an American Highway. This image is made of thousands of photographs and is almost 2 meters high by 3 meters wide. When seen in real life your eyes can explore it from corner to corner. Hockney would have had to bend down to photograph the floor, climb up ladders to photograph the street signs and walk down the highway to photograph the horizon. All this took him 8 days so he not only warped space and distance but also showed the passing of time in one image. The image also showed the scene from multiple viewpoints – just like the way we see the world.
Below is my analysis of the image
This is another one of Hockney’s famous joiners, taken with his two friends. He took this over about an hour, as his friends completed the crossword. The colour in this image is muted, and the image is slightly grey/blue-toned. This is influenced by the high amounts of grey and blue in the image: the walls, the hair of both people, and objects on the table. – The white balance in this photo is cool-toned, however, there are warmer tones in the faces of the two people. The image is mostly balanced in exposure, but slightly overexposed in some parts of the photos of the subjects – this is a sign of time passing in this piece as the light was changing throughout the shoot. The lines of every image placed together created shape within the piece, and create a natural focal point in the centre of the image. The background is much plainer than the foreground: it only really features a wall and manipulated placement of two windows, one to the left and one to the right – The background’s plainness enhances the business of the foreground and centre of the image. There is an influence of cubism in this image, which is a huge part of David Hockney’s influence on his joiners. The way the image’s shape and look have been altered from what the real view of the picture would have been related to the key themes in David Hockney’s joiners: Time, because of the different obvious time and lighting points in the piece and space, because of all of the different angles and altered placement of images.
