Across a long lifetime and productive until the end, David Hockney, who has died aged 88, was Britain’s most popular artist, and one of very few painters anywhere to be a household name. Already heralded a draughtsman of genius at the Royal College of Art in 1959, over seven decades he created paintings of places and people which are both instantly alluring in their crystalline, stylised yet lucidly observed realism, and highly sophisticated pictorial constructions. “I think the world is beautiful and exciting and mysterious,” he said; his paintings communicate that pleasure.
大卫·霍克尼(David Hockney)逝世，享年88岁。在他漫长的一生中，他始终高产创作，直到生命最后阶段仍未停笔。他是英国最受欢迎的艺术家，也是世界范围内极少数家喻户晓的画家之一。早在1959年就读于英国皇家艺术学院(Royal College of Art)时，他已被誉为天才素描家。此后七十年间，他创作了大量描绘地点与人物的绘画：这些作品以晶莹剔透、风格化却观察入微的写实风格，令人一眼着迷，同时又是高度精妙的图像构成。霍克尼曾说：“我认为这个世界是美丽、令人兴奋而又神秘的。”他的绘画传达的正是这种愉悦。