Celia Amused 1979 Hand Signed - HS

Year1979

Hand SignedSigned And Dated By the Artist in Pencil 

Condition Excellent 

Purchased fromAuction House 2019 

Provenance / HistoryProvenance: Private Collection, Ontario, Canada 

Story / Additional InfoDavid Hockney (Born 1937). Title: Celia Amused. Medium: Original Lithograph, 1979, on Toyoshi 80 paper, signed and dated by the artist in pencil. Printed by: Kenneth Tyler, Gemini G.E.L., Los Angeles. Note: In 1979, British artist David Hockney partnered with printmakers Gemini G.E.L. on a series of lithographs of his good friend and muse Celia Birtwell. Birtwell was a textile designer and was the wife of Ossie Clark, an established fashion designer in London during the 1960s and 1970s. Hockney is quoted as saying, “Celia is one of the few girls I know really well. I don’t bother getting the likeness in her face because I know it so well. She has many faces and I think if you looked through all the drawings I’ve done of her, you’d see that they don’t look alike.” In comparing this work with Celia - Weary, lot 006 in this session, this print illustrates this sentiment. The variation he captured is quite remarkable, as he conveys her expression with so few strokes. This work and others like it, are a symbol of friendship at its finest, one that has lasted over half a century, and continues to this day. Working at home the artist used large brushes and liquid washes in varying intensities to paint on aluminium plates. There were 5 images made for printed editions reflecting Celia’s moods and attitudes: Celia Musing, Celia Weary, Celia Amused, Celia Inquiring and Celia Elegant. Literature: David Hockney Prints - Tokyo Museum Catalogue 222. David Hockney, The David Hockney Foundation. Collections: The David Hockney Foundation, The Stedijk Musaeum, Amsterdam ; National Gallery of Australia, Exhibitions: 5//2/2014 Hockney, Printmaker - The Dulwich Picture Gallery 

Certificate of AuthenticityArt Brokerage 

LID139306

David Hockney - United Kingdom

Art Brokerage: David Hockney is one of the most influential British artists of the 20th century. He is perhaps best known for his serial paintings of swimming pools, portraits of friends, and verdant landscapes. The artist's oeuvre ranges from collaged photography and opera posters, to Cubist-inspired abstractions and plein-air paintings of the English countryside. Often returning to a certain motif again and again, he probes the manifold ways one can see an image or a space. Hockney's exploration of photography's effect on painting and everyday life is evinced in his hallmark work A Bigger Splash (1967). "In art, new ways of seeing mean new ways of feeling; you can't divorce the two, as, we are now aware, you cannot have time without space and space without time," he has explained. Born on July 9, 1937 in Bradford, United Kingdom, Hockney attended the Royal College of Art in London alongside R.B. Kitaj. At school, he studied under both Francis Bacon and Peter Blake, but also credits Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse for influencing his distinctive and varied style. In 1963, the artist traveled to Southern California for the first time and fell in love with the bright sunshine and easygoing lifestyle. Since then, he has alternated living and working between Yorkshire, United Kingdom, and Los Angeles, CA. In 2017, the artist was the subject of a comprehensive retrospective which opened to critical acclaim at the Tate Gallery in London. Hockney's works are presently held in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, and the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne. Listings wanted.