Born
in the small town of Bradford in the north of England in 1937, Hockney
had to fight to become an artist. After leaving his home for the Royal
College
of Art in London, his career flourished, his work appearing in
galleries and sold alongside his professor’s works while still a
student, but he continued to struggle with a sense of not belonging
because of his homosexuality, which had yet to be decriminalized,
and his inclination for a figurative style of art not sufficiently
“contemporary” to be valued. Trips to New York and California—where he
would live for many years and paint his iconic swimming pools—introduced
him to new scenes and new loves, beginning a
journey that would take him through the fraught years of the AIDS
epidemic.
Cusset, author of thirteen award-winning, best-selling literary novels translated into eighteen languages, and whose novel
L'autre qu'on adorait was shortlisted for the Prix Goncourt in
2016, skillfully depicts a David Hockey driven by impulse to always do
and create what resonates most viscerally. In her intimate and lively
portrait, Cusset submerges the reader in Hockney’s
life with clear and bright prose, offering a lens into an artist of
unlimited and unfiltered potential, reflected and represented through
his dynamic oeuvre, but also as a human being with a tireless work
ethic, caring deeply for his family and friends, stumbling
and vulnerable at times and defined also by the turns of adversity and
loss.
LIFE OF DAVID HOCKNEY offers an original look inside the life of a groundbreaking artist in form and style, a painter,
draftsman and set designer whose art is as accessible as it is compelling, and whose passion to create is never deterred by heartbreak, illness or loss.
