David Hockney: iPriest of Art (Evening Standard 30th April 2009)

Mixed media: David Hockney in his London studio with his iPhone,
which has its own mini easel

By Geordie Greig

"Who would ever have thought that the telephone would bring back drawing," says David Hockney, who has been using an iPhone to make some of his new pictures. He has swapped paint for pixels to extend the scope of his ever-changing art.
He has only had an iPhone for four months but is an evangelical convert. Already he has painted flowers, drawn landscapes, played the keyboards on a virtual piano and, of course, spoken incessantly on the phone. His has a screechingly loud police-siren ringtone to compensate for his deafness.
Hockney also loves to use his phone to send by email his latest theories on the history of drawing, using images of Picasso to Rembrandt. "Sometimes I lie in bed and send illustrated art lectures to friends and also my own iPhone paintings. No camera is involved. I like to draw flowers by hand on the iPhone and send them out to friends so they get fresh flowers. And my flowers last! They never die!" His tip on phone-art: "You must stroke the screen very softly," he confides.
His love affair with the iPhone is single-minded. "BlackBerries are for secretaries and clerical workers while the iPhone is used by artistic people," he declares as he touches the tiny screen to show a new picture of irises, made, he declares triumphantly, without using paint, film, ink or pencil. "This is all new territory for art," he says, as he rests his iPhone on its own wooden mini easel on a table in his London studio.
Aged 71, Hockney is momentarily tongued-tied when it comes to describing his new work. "It's absurd to call it digital art. That is like calling a traditional drawing pencil art. What I can tell you is that when I am drawing on a phone or computer, I just know I am making 'drawings in a printing machine.'"
That is the title of an exhibition of his new work which opens today at the Annely Juda gallery in Mayfair. It is of pictures mostly made using a computer, camera and also painting on printouts from them. The show includes landscapes of Yorkshire and portraits of his family and friends. The pictures - a hybrid of old-fashioned draughtsmanship and hi-tech wizardry - are all for sale in limited editions of up to 30 copies.
"I used to think a computer was too slow for a draughtsman. You finished a line and the computer reacted 15 seconds later but things have changed and now you can draw very freely and fast with colour." But while Hockney loves his art wizardry he despairs at the political scene in Britain. "I am annoyed they want to interfere with my life. I am perfectly willing to pay the tax. I do mind them telling me I can't smoke. Parliament is the worst it has ever been. They debate nothing serious."
He tries to remain unfazed by what he sees as political and cultural vandalism. "It is appalling that they have spent 30 years discussing plans for education. Any party that has been discussing education for so long is bound to be swindling two generations."
He remains optimistic by making images of "things I consider beautiful. I like things that are pretty. I always have. It is good for your health. I happen to like the way that an iPhone has a sense of the absurd about it and is therefore close to life."

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