David Hockney: A Pilgrim's Progress

In this fascinating and entertaining second volume, Christopher Sykes explores the life and work of our most popular living artist.
David Hockney's career has spanned the past five decades. Volume 1, A Rake's Progress, covered his early life: his precocious achievement at Bradford Art College and the Swinging Sixties in London, where he befriended many of the iconic cultural figures of the generation. Picking up Hockney's story in 1975, this volume, A Pilgrim's Progress, finds him traveling between Notting Hill and California, where he took inspiration for the swimming pool series of paintings; creating the acclaimed set designs for operas around the world; and embracing emerging technologies—the camera and fax machine in the 1970s and 1980s, and, most recently, the iPad. Hockney's boundless energy extends to his personal life too, and this volume illuminates his glamorous social life as well as his sometimes turbulent relationships.
With unprecedented access to Hockney's paintings, notebooks, diaries, and the man himself, this second volume continues the lively and revelatory account of an acclaimed artist and an extraordinary man.