Representing Mother******s

But it works both ways — Hockney's confidence in his skills makes him completely comfortable importing them into new technological realms, as he has amply demonstrated using the Polaroid SX70, photocopy and fax machines, and — most recently — the iPhone Brushes app. "More Drawing in a Printing Machine" — his upstairs show at Louver — consists of his recent spate of portraiture, created with Photoshop and Graphics Tablet. The subjects are the usual Hockney suspects — relatives, friends, acquaintances, studio assistants — but the new medium has brought the artist's observational acumen and formidable visual facility into sharp focus.

Composed entirely on the computer, then output as large-scale ink-jet prints, the portraits resemble a combination of airbrush and felt-tip marker. Some objects or body parts are rendered in large, blurry clouds of color, while other areas — the faces, always — have been obviously enlarged and worked over with a fine tooth stylus. The results are among the most convincing digital art I've seen, unencumbered by Special Effects fetishism or ham-fisted academic structuralism (aka art by people who can afford an MFA and state-of-the-art imaging technology, but can't draw for shit).

DAVID HOCKNEY, MATELOT KEVIN DRUEZ 2 (2009)

Related Content

• James Cameron Must Turn Over to Eric Ryder his Script for Avatar in Battle Over Who Created the Sci-Fi World
  January 23, 2013
• Fire in the neighborhood
  April 18, 2013
• From Abe to Aliens: Your Weekly Movie To-Do List
  November 8, 2012
• One Day Boyle Heights Artist Fabian Debora Tried to Take His Own Life on the I-5. That's When He Had an Epiphany
  March 11, 2013
• From Opera to the Terminator: Your Weekly Movie To-Do List
  February 20, 2013

More About

• David Hockney
• Chas Garabedian
• Istanbul
• Visual Arts
• Arts, Entertainment, and Media

The challenge of finding his feet — or rather his eye and hand — in yet another virtual reality has quickened Hockney's creativity, and his delight is palpable. Like Garabedian, Hockney's luckiest trick is finding a way to keep his objectives just slightly ahead of his imaginative grasp, transforming the illustrational impulse into an ever-evolving experiment in mapping the intricacies of the human nervous system and psyche on both a personal and an objective level. It's the kind of enthusiasm that one finds in the work of young artists, but that often dissipates as their careers progress and they mummify in their comfort zones. By all reasonable expectation, Garabedian and Hockney (the latter turns 73 in July) should be resting on their laurels or pushing up artistic daisies, but curiosity keeps these cats alive.

CHARLES GARABEDIAN: RECENT PAINTINGS | DAVID HOCKNEY: MORE DRAWING IN A PRINTING MACHINE | Through May 8 | L.A. Louver, 45 N. Venice Blvd., Venice | lalouver.com