“Water, the idea of drawing water, is always appealing to me... You can look on it, through it, into it, see it as volume, see it as surface...the idea of representing it has always rather fascinated me and I keep going back to it”
—David Hockney

Considered Britain’s most successful living artist, for David Hockney it is the swimming pool motif that has become a symbol of his worldwide acclaim. Hockney’s obsession with pools originated in 1964, when the artist first travelled from post-war London to sunny Los Angeles. While flying over the southern Californian city, the artist noticed a multitude of swimming pools dotted across the land. Hockney recalled: “As we flew in over Los Angeles I looked down to see blue swimming pools all over, and I realised that a swimming pool in England would have been a luxury, whereas here they are not, because of the climate.” Born in a working-class family in Northern England, Hockney found in Los Angeles the land of the American Dream, and swimming pools soon appeared to him as a socio-economic emblem through which he visually defined the utopian-like city.

Claude Monet, La Grenouillère, 1869, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Image: © The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, H. O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, 1929, 29.100.112

Water and, in particular, its inherent connection to light, has been an endless source of fascination for artists. Hockney made numerous acrylic paintings of swimming pools between the 1960s and 1970s and continued to return to the motif in various media. In the late 1970s, encouraged by his close friend, the master printmaker Kenneth Tyler, the artist turned to lithography to address the technical challenge of depicting water’s ever-shifting surface. Completed in 1980, Pool Made with Paper Blue Ink, from Paper Pools, presents dynamic blue gestures that evoke the water’s constant movement and variations in colour. The interlocking cross-hatch overlaid with flowing blue brushmarks strikingly conveys the depth of the pool and the energetic motion of the water’s surface. A diving board projects out at a diagonal angle, echoing the modernist cantilevers of Los Angeles’ architecture and contrasting with the vibrant colours of the swimming pool below. The diving board’s bold shadow, which wobbles as it enters the pool, conveys the dazzling sunlight of this poolside scene.

Kenneth Tyler resting on the diving board of his swimming pool. Image: © Lindsay Green.

Printed by Tyler Graphics, Pool Made with Paper Blue Ink for Book attests to the close creative relationship between Hockney and Kenneth Tyler. Following their first collaboration on a set of six colour lithographs entitled The Hollywood Collection in 1965, Hockney continued to work with Tyler for almost four decades. Pool Made with Paper Blue Ink for Book, from Paper Pools was in fact inspired by Tyler’s backyard swimming pool – as Hockney recalls:

“Ken had a swimming pool in the garden… I kept looking at the swimming pool… it was a wonderful subject – water, the light on the water… every time you see it, it takes on a different character. You look at the surface, you look below it, you look through it, everyday it looks different.”
—David Hockney

Hockney’s swimming pools, including Pool Made with Paper and Blue Ink for Book, are celebrated as one of the most instantly recognisable images in contemporary art. They are an embodiment of positivity, serenity, and joy, expressive of the freedom that characterised Los Angeles in the sixties and seventies. Furthermore, emblematic of the artist’s endeavours in depicting the fluid appearance of water, Hockney’s lithographic pool prints are a remarkable example of the artist’s diversity in approaches to printmaking, confirming his ranks as one of the most significant and innovative artists of his generation.
- Literature
  Tyler Graphics 269
  Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo 234
- Artist 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.
  
  View More Works

9

David Hockney

Pool Made with Paper and Blue Ink for Book, from Paper Pools (T.G. 269, M.C.A.T. 234)

1980
Lithograph in colours, on Arches Cover paper, the full sheet, with the accompanying book Paper Pools and its card slipcase.
S. 26.6 x 22.8 cm (10 1/2 x 8 7/8 in.)
book 27.5 x 23.5 x 1.8 cm (10 7/8 x 9 1/4 x 0 3/4 in.)
Signed, dated and numbered 425/1000 in pencil, the book signed in sepia ink and stamp-numbered '425' on the justification, the card slipcase stamp-numbered '432', (there were also 100 artist's proofs), published by Tyler Graphics, Ltd., Bedford Village, New York (with their blindstamp), framed.

Full Cataloguing

Estimate
£25,000 - 35,000 ♠

Sold for £40,640

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