The colourful life of Howard Hodgkin
March 22nd, 2008, 9:55 pm Hobbies Ideas
Sir Howard Hodgkin bobs towards me like a cork floating on a choppy sea. He is
limping, hobbling. While waiting for him to emerge from his afternoon rest,
Andy Barker, his assistant, showed me a collection of Hodgkin%26rsquo;s latest
paintings, the subject of his first show of new work in London since 1999.
The artist%26rsquo;s studio, a huge, white converted dairy with amazing light, is set
behind his Victorian townhouse on a road near the British Museum. There is a
central bank of scrap and materials, a table of brushes, a basement with
shelves of books and two dusty armchairs. Barker conducts a massive game of
show and not-much-tell, sliding canvas covers that conceal the paintings
this way and that, and deflects the most innocuous inquiry %26ndash; How long does
he work for in a typical day? %26ndash; with a He%26rsquo;ll talk about that. I wouldn%26rsquo;t
be so sure. The 75-year-old Hodgkin, one of Britain%26rsquo;s most pre-eminent
artists, doesn%26rsquo;t describe his pictures; they are representations of
emotional moments, daubs and swooshes of bright, dramatic colour with
titles such as Privacy and Self-Expression in the Bedroom and Degas%26rsquo;s
Russian Dancers. Their shapes and details rarely directly allude to their
titles.
Many interviews with Hodgkin mention that he is reticent and intimidating, and
he is widely reputed to be irascible and a bit of a pressure cooker. Sir
Nicholas Serota, director of Tate Galleries, says: He is highly emotional.
It is not difficult to make Howard cry, but it is not an affectation. His
emotions are very close to the surface and are there in the depth of colour
he uses in his paintings. Certain subjects seem off limits %26ndash; no one writes
about Hodgkin%26rsquo;s private life, beyond recycling that he was a married father
of two when he came out as gay in the late Seventies. Last year, the critics
gave him a kicking for a career-spanning retrospective at the Tate, so it%26rsquo;s
surprising that he%26rsquo;s entering the fray again with this show. But he%26rsquo;s
exacting, as he puts it, and determined to gain recognition, which
amazingly he doesn%26rsquo;t feel he has, despite his public, if not critical,
popularity and the large sums paid for his works.
Some of the pictures take years to complete, like Ozone, which he started in
2004 and finished only last year. Serota tells me Hodgkin can sit for
hours, days, weeks planning each painting. Four new works (Hodgkin has
still to complete the fourth) are taken from the chorus to Home on the
Range, a cowboy song he heard when he was eight. I ask Barker (tufty-haired,
utterly discreet) if he enjoys working with Hodgkin. Very much. I can%26rsquo;t
unravel the mysteries of him. Twelve years is a long time, so I must enjoy
it.
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