David Hockney enters new phase: no more Constable

Documentary shows an artist who matters leave his pastoral period and begin to match himself against modern masters

David Hockney has a mean line in self-portraits. Mean to himself, that is. As he has got older he has periodically sat or stood in front of a mirror and recorded exactly what he sees in alarmingly exact and ruthless detail. Yet this man who can stare himself in the eye so boldly admits he wasuncomfortable watching nearly two hours of his image on screen in the documentary Hockney, released in cinemas this weekend.

“I have seen the film three times. The first time I’m even a bit embarrassed by all the footage of me,” he told me from Los Angeles.

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