setUoYouRPROFILE's blog: "tufui"

David Hockney has always been an avid doodler, whether meandering the English countryside or the decidedly un-countrified landscapes of Los Angeles. So much so, in fact, that when he started having his suits and jackets custom-made at Savile Row in the 1970s — he’s been among the most successful painters in the world for about that long — he had them sew in a large interior pocket to hold his sketchbook. Over the long march of technology from then to now, Hockney’s suits haven’t needed alteration.sacs louis vuitton Now on display at the Royal Ontario Musuem is “Fresh Flowers,” a selection of images made with Hockney’s current sketchbook of choice: Apple’s iPad, which, through a remarkably simple and adaptable application called Brushes, has become a suit-pocket studio of sorts to indulge Hockney’s ever-curious eye. It makes for an unconventional museum display: A row of small screens, all of them vertical, fastened tight to the wall. Some present slow-motion slide shows, lingering on each luminous, quirkily cartoonish drawing for a minute or so before fading into the next. Others are fast-motion animated versions of the artist at work: cross-hatching deep facial for crevices for a portrait of his friend, Morris Payne, or a moody evening cityscape as seen from a dark interior, peeking through heavy drapes. All together, there are 100 drawings iPad drawings displayed on 25 iPads, and another 100 drawings Hockney made on the tiny screen of his iPhone. If it seems like an odd turn for a 72-year old contemporary master painter to take, think again: Hockney’s always been a willing experimentalist, morphing his classical training and interests as a modern painter into new realms like set design for theatre. He’s dabbled with technology before, too, using Photoshop to create a series of prints. His i-art came about less by design than by happenstance, though. Hockney is famously hard of hearing; a few years ago he got an iPhone so he could communicate with friends via text messaging. In his always-curious fashion, the artist was an avid peruser of the iTunes app store, and quickly came across Brushes, which he downloaded and started to fiddle with almost immediately. In his bedroom in Bridlington on the northeastern coast of England, Hockney would have fresh flowers replaced every couple of days. Rolling over in the morning, it wasn’t uncommon of him to sketch them in his book. But in the darker mornings of fall and winter, when natural light wouldn’t allow it, Hockney turned to his iPhone. He found the immediacy of the experience could be shared just as immediately, a world away.