David Hockney has been described by art critics as the playboy of the art world, so I was really excited because I found that his work was being displayed in Cartwright Hall in Bradford, a good location considering the city is his home town! Having not seen any of his art work and only heard his name mentioned briefly in the good old days of GCSE Art lessons, I was unsure what I was going to see and if I would actually like his style.
 | | Bradford through Hockneys eyes |
As soon as I stepped foot in the gallery I was amazed at the huge range of techniques he had used in creating these fantastic pieces. Not only had he used paint, he had used biros, pencils of different thicknesses, material and photographs. Each gallery was alive with colour, texture and art of different sizes. I loved the abstract feel the room projected because I felt at home there! His early works, found in the first gallery were light hearted and jokey in mood in. I really liked his choice of colours because they jumped out and made the pieces appear really energetic.
I wanted to call them examples of brilliant Pop Art although I found that he rejected the Pop Artist label because he wanted his work to be taken seriously.
 | | The man himself! |
I found that his later work had a completely different style and approach. Moving away from the rough edges and graffiti style, he went on to creating art that had a sense of realism to it. Saying that, I'm using the word realism in its loosest form and adding masses of abstractness into the equation! His photography work was brilliant, although I think that he wore out the idea of photographic collages, after creating a few pieces using that technique. A photo collage of ring roads, buildings and loads more things that made up Bradford was cool because I could see just how much the city has changed since the pictures were taken. I liked the photographs of Bolton Abbey because he had taken the shots at different times of the day and put them all together at the end. The contrast between the colours was impressive and gave the impression that the actual structure of the Abbey was warped! Strange but striking! He has also done some portraits that I have to say are outstanding! I had to inspect them very closely to see if they weren't photographs. Seeing these pieces made me stifle a tear because all I can manage is stick men and I'm actually trying really hard! It was brilliant to see that he could take his artistic talents to new levels.
 | | All the colours of the sunset |
The boldest, yet simplest, paintings were my favourites. He used blues, greens, purples, reds, well all of the colours! I liked the landscape paintings and how he used the colours to take your eye around the whole picture or make you focus on just one point of the picture. But it doesn't stop there…
I really liked ‘Le Plongeur, Paper Pool’ and ‘Man in a Shower’ because he managed to capture the reflection of the pool and the distortion of the swimmer and the splashes of water from the shower. His work is awesome and I am quite disappointed in myself that I never looked at his work before now! All I can say after seeing his stuff is that I wish I had natural artistic talent and be another playboy, well playgirl of Bradford! The exhibition 'From Hollywood to Bradford and Back Again' continues at Cartwright HallÌý in Bradford until November 5 2006. (With thanks to Cartwright Hall for allowing me to use their pictures in this piece.) Ìý | 
