Hotel Acatlan: Second Day (1984-85) is comprised of two large-scale lithographs that together create a panoramic view of the Hotel Romano Angeles in Acatlán, Mexico. In its dynamic representation of the hotel courtyard, Hotel Acatlán: Second Day is emblematic of Hockney’s extensive investigations during the 1980s into perspective and the depiction of space.
“It is not about a hotel, but about an attitude to space.”
—David HockneyIn February 1984, Hockney travelled from California to Mexico City for the opening of his solo exhibition Hockney Paints the Stage at the Museo Rufino Tamayo. Upon his return, his car broke down and the artist decided to make a stop at the nearby Hotel Romano Angeles. Hockney was captivated by the hotel’s tropical interior courtyard, especially the angles and various viewpoints that one can look at it from. As he wrote in a letter to his friend and fellow artist, R.B. Kitaj, “the effect of the space is extremely strong, yet it is not an illusion you want to walk into, because you are already in the picture and walking around”.i Hockney drew many quick sketches of the hotel before travelling back to Los Angeles, where he complete a monumental oil painting entitled A Walk Around the Hotel Courtyard, Acatlán composed across two canvases. In September 1984, Hockney returned to the Hotel Romano Angeles, this time with his close friend, the master printmaker Kenneth Tyler. During their one-week stay at the hotel, Hockney worked on six lithographic prints of the hotel’s courtyard, including Hotel Acatlán: Second Day.
Biago d'Antonio, The Story of Joseph, 1482, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Image: © Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Friedsam Collection, Bequest of Michael Friedsam, 1931 
Eighteen Songs of a Nomand Flute: The Story of Lady Wenji, early 15th century, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Image: © Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Ex coll.: C. C. Wang Family, Gift of The Dillon Fund, 1973, 1973.120.3 “Renaissance European perspective has a vanishing point, but it does not exist in Japanese and Chinese painting. And a view from sitting still, from a stationary point, is not the way you usually see landscape; you are always moving through it.”
—David HockneyHotel Acatlán: Second Day is emblematic of Hockney’s attuned sense of perspective and, in particular, his rejection of Western single-point perspective. Following the work of Filippo Brunelleschi in c.1415, artists during the Renaissance began devising compositions that employed orthogonals, especially in architectural features, which converged at a single vanishing point in order to accurately convey space. Hockney, however, feels that compositions with multiple viewpoints or non-linear perspective, such as in traditional Chinese and Japanese manuscripts or in modern Cubist artworks, much more closely resemble how one naturally sees. When at the Hotel Acatlán, Hockney moved around the inner courtyard, making drawings from different positions and then combining different viewpoints into single compositions. Straight architectural features, such as the roof and paths, are rendered in curved lines and the diminution of shapes varies throughout the composition. As a result, the space is dynamic and the multiple perspectives convey movement and the passing of time, creating the sense that the viewer is walking through the courtyard together with Hockney.To produce the lithographs, Hockney utilised an innovative printing technique developed by Tyler in the 1980s. Using bright inks and crayons, Hockney drew directly onto a booklet of transparent Mylar sheets, which allowed him to form the composition in situ whilst also creating the separations of colour which would later be used for the different layers of the print. Once finalised, the Mylar sheets were transferred to forty-eight aluminium plates and printed at Tyler’s workshop in Bedford Village, New York. When describing Hockney’s approach to print-making, Tyler said: “David has always had a keen sense of process and a knack for bypassing established methodologies to arrive at previously undiscovered uses for new materials and techniques.” In the present lot, this innovative approach to printmaking is combined with the artist's groundbreaking use of multiple perspectives. The result is a dynamic composition that truly embodies the central themes of Hockney's oeuvre.
i David Hockney in a letter to friend R.B. Kitaj, A Walk Around the Hotel Courtyard, Acatlán, Hockney: The Biography, p. 209.
Provenance
Mallet, Japan Modern and Contemporary Art, 16 May 2019, lot 109
Acquired at the above sale by the present ownerLiterature
Tyler Graphics 283
Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo 270Artist Biography
David Hockney
David Hockney (b. 1937) is one of the most well-known and celebrated artists of the
20th and 21st centuries. He works across many mediums, including painting, collage,
and more recently digitally, by creating print series on iPads. His works show semi-
abstract representations of domestic life, human relationships, floral, fauna, and the
changing of seasons.
Hockney has exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Royal
Academy of Arts in London, and the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, among many
other institutions. On the secondary market, his work has sold for more than $90
million.
Property From a Private British Collection
49
Hotel Acatlán: Second Day, from Moving Focus (T.G. 283, M.C.A.T. 270)
1984-85
Lithograph in colours, on two sheets of TGL handmade paper (as issued), the full sheets.
overall S. 73.9 x 192.4 cm (29 1/8 x 75 3/4 in.)
Signed, dated and numbered 'A.P. X/XX' in pencil (one of 20 artist's proofs, the edition was 98), published by Tyler Graphics Ltd., Bedford Village, New York (with their blindstamp), 1985, framed.
Estimate
£50,000 - 70,000 ♠
Sold for £107,950
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David Hockney
London Auction 21 September 2023
