From today’s Guardian, this sad story:
Summer and winter are safe, but when David Hockney turned up to begin work on spring, he found a scene which the artist described as “a massacre”; the sky empty, and the ground littered with the limbs of fallen giants. Nothing remains except stacks of sawn trunks and branches of the little copse of mighty sycamores and beeches near his home in East Yorkshire which he had intended to paint in all seasons.
‘Summer’ is above, ‘Winter’ below; the other two seasons are unpainted. Full story: David Hockney, the fallen beech trees and the lost canvas
Last April Hockney gave Bigger Trees Near Warter, the largest painting he has ever made – a landscape 12 metres long by five metres tall (40ft by 15ft) – to the Tate. Full story (Guardian)
Links
- ‘Cooler than Warhol, more enduring than Freud‘: Guardian interview 2006
That's How The Light Gets In 
That was a nice article wasn’t it? I blogged about it myself. Poor Hockney. I loved the way he described it as almost a temple; I’ve felt that way myself about such places…
Sad in one way but of course this is a very short term view. I imagine David enjoys using brushes with wooden handles and canvas stretched on a wooden frame. Maybe he even works in s studio with a wooden floor, and is lucky enough to heat it with wood.
Those trees were planted 198 years ago as a crop. Little the foresters know then that the trees would not only bear a valuable crop of timber, but also act as a carbon sink and produce fuel for heat and energy.
Actually, I think the art work will benefit from this as it can reflect the reality of life, and of woodland management. Now he can revisit the wood in five year’s time and be filled with joy with the new woodland that will have sprung to life in its place. This would be a really interesting longer term artwork, depicting the rebirth of a woodland, and not just another ‘nature through the seasons’!
http://sylvafoundation.wordpress.com/
It was interesting to see the reactions that this story evoked. In today’s Guardian (1.04.09) a well-argued reply from the Sylva Foundation. You read it here first!