補習-Bigger Trees Near Warter —不僅更大而且更好

編者按：David Hockney的鄉村畫通過夏季金黃的大地、秋日的薄霧、冰封的寒冬和花朵盛開的春天來展示四季更替，改變了我們觀察鄉村的視角。此次他將自己Bigger Trees Near Warter捐贈給英國Tate現代美術館. David Hockney is no fool. He understands art history - he has, after all, written books about it. For almost half a century he has succeeded in maintaining a place in the world of art, however unfashionable or odd the directions he happened to be taking. He's pursued his own interests, and at the same time kept his art in the public eye. And in giving his painting Bigger Trees Near Warter to the Tate he executed a masterstroke. This painting, which has just gone on view for all to see at Tate Britain, will do his reputation wonders as the century progresses. It is a triumph. You thought Hockney was old hat? We all get it wrong. Art is beautiful because it makes fools of us. You can set up any ideology you like, define taste by any criteria you choose, and a work of art will come along to stand your prejudice on its head. If you prove by logic and erudition that art cannot come readymade, some young philosophe will display the most incredible found object that was ever put in a vitrine. This is what happened to critics 20 years ago. Nowadays, the prejudices are reversed - and so are the surprises. As the artistic ideas of the 1990s gradually sputter out, the life comes from elsewhere. From Bridlington, in this case. I've seen Hockney's studio there, and it's just a room in his house, with a view over the town. It's bizarre to think of him creating the vast Bigger Trees Near Warter in this little working space. But of course, he also has spacious facilities in Los Angeles. Did he make this picture piece by piece in Yorkshire, or finish it in LA? I don't know. It's just one of the musings that occur to you when you are surrounded by painted trees glowing in a perfumed light. Pinks and purples, a world under the sky - a largeness that caresses. Hockney believes that painting must renew itself by confronting nature. It is about hand, eye, brain and heart. You look, you feel, you sketch. Putting his easel in the open air like a 19th-century French landscape artist, he has set out to paint in a pure and honest way. And as you contemplate one of the best pictures he has ever made, you've got admit he has a point. 實習生 fuji 編輯

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