David Hockney: 'When I paint, I feel I'm 30'

it's the digits that are doing it it's digital photography because uh in in one of the pictures downstairs of uh the card players there's a picture on the wall of PE Blossom Highway which was a photograph I made 30 years ago using chemical photography though and there you had to paste them on and things and uh uh it was okay but uh 35 years later uh using digital photography I mean I've realized well you can I mean these chairs here every chair has a vanishing point so you actually look at each chair shair well if it was one photograph you don't you just look at one photograph it's the same time in the top of the photograph is how many photographs is that probably about 30 or 40 oh well it's uh probably 200 actually because the room itself is made up of a lot more as well there is a flaw in in in perspective painters have always known it I mean that's why cubism is there because cubism is about the foreground isn't it everything is close to us but I have found that uh if you move if you move these things about you're getting a very different way of looking and uh I can see it's a different way of seeing and uh I think it's exciting actually I'm going to do it more I am what is also exciting is the sheer output I mean you're so prolific well I I mean I don't go out much I mean I just in California I just live in the studio really I I go to bed at 9:00 I get up at 8:00 and I just live in the studio really I mean that's all I want to do now my age that's all I care about really but it's a big contrast from your Royal Academy show where there were no humans really the whole thing was trees and organic life uh this is an incredible contrast and it's only two years on well it's all about looking though it's still all about looking uh in Yorkshire I was always looking looking looking uh this is looking looking you're quoted as saying that after the death of your assistant Elliot you nearly gave up and that for four months you didn't paint at all well yeah I didn't I didn't paint much I mean uh what got me painting was JP sitting like this it was sitting like this and I suddenly thought of that van goof paint uh at eternity's gate and uh I painted him like that and uh that got me going on portraits and then I've I've done 61 portraits so far I mean um I'm just going to go on doing them it's hard to imagine it's hard even to recall another British Artist who has ever kept such momentum I mean you're you know you're closing on 80 you'll be 78 in July and yet you seem to have the energy that you had at the time of the bigger Splash well I mean you get you get energy painting I mean when I paint I feel I'm 30 I do actually it's only when I stop I feel my age but uh I I don't mind and uh I still smoke and I smoke because it's part of the work I mean when I'm painting I don't smoke because you can't smoke you your hands are doing but when I stop to think about it I'd always smoke then well anybody who's telling me not to smoke would be telling me to at that moment think about my body that's what I'd be asked to do think about my body well I don't want to think about my body I don't want I'll think about the pictures how do it so what does the smoke do does it kind of is it something which it's just a pleasure it's a pleasure it is a pleasure but you know I don't know what you feel about the England and the Britain you left behind but you know an interesting thing that this new government here this new Parliament has more and lesbian people in it 32 than any other legislature in the world what do you make of that does that surpris good it's rather good yeah surprise uh yeah it's not you wouldn't think of that of old England would you no I wouldn't no it's rather good I think do do you think attitudes have now calmed and arrived in a good place or is there still more of the journey to go um well I think it it's a lot better than it used to be I mean there's less Bohemia but I mean think loads of things are better though they are yes they are are you as happy as you've ever been yes really yeah yeah I mean as I ever am yeah yeah I like painting I mean I like making pictures I now see there's new ways to make pictures and I find that very exciting actually that very exciting indeed new ways to make pictures yeah David hotney thank you very much for talking to us

Channel: Channel 4 News

Views: 116,438

Keywords: Channel 4 News, 4 News, Channel 4, news, latest news, breaking news, news today, david hockney, david hockney artist, hockney art, hockney painting

Id: 7edLmVtaLkQ

Length: 6min 50sec (410 seconds)

Published: Thu May 14 2015