27/04/2025
In the summer of 2002, Hockney sat for Freud for over a hundred hours across four months; one sitting was brilliantly captured on camera by David Dawson. Dawson had anticipated Freud’s apparent surprise on re-entering the studio to find a camera pointed at him, while Hockney waited, ashtray at his feet, matching the talkative expression of his portrait.
This mise en scène perfectly encapsulates the uncompromising analysis and palpable frisson that Freud so successfully translated into paint:
“It’s to do with the feeling of individuality and the intensity of the regard and the focus on the specific. So I think portraiture is an attitude.” (Lucian Freud)
David Hockney later reflected:
“It’s a duration, not a moment; not many people could look at a face for 120 hours and constantly do something with it.”
He also recalled:
“I was fascinated with his technique. At times, I thought he might have pre-mixed colours to speed it up for me, but I quickly realised he wouldn’t do that, as he wanted as much time as possible. Because of this, we could talk. Lucian’s talk was always fascinating. Sometimes it was just gossip about people we both knew — very amusing, very good put-downs that made me laugh. But we talked about drawing a lot. Rembrandt, Picasso, Ingres, Tiepolo… I remember he didn’t like Morandi. We talked a lot about Rembrandt drawings and how everything he did is a portrait — no hand or face is generic.”
Sotheby’s
