With the sad passing of artist David Hockney, we pay tribute to one of Bradford’s best-loved sons, a proud Yorkshireman who never stopped loving life.

By Mark Bowness

He was the boy from Bradford who grew up to become one of the world’s most influential and revered artists of the 20th and 21st centuries.

David Hockney who died in June, a month short of his 89th birthday, will forever be remembered for his vibrant and innovative artworks.

Having risen to prominence as a leading figure of the 1960s pop art movement, Hockney went on to have a career spanning more than seven decades, multiple continents and an astonishing range of media: oil paint, photography, stage design, print making and in later years the iPad.

His 1972 painting A Bigger Splash became one of the most recognisable images in 20th-century art, while in 2018 his Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures) sold for nearly £70 million at auction, a record for a living artist at the time.

Born in Eccleshill in 1937, Hockney attended Wellington Primary School before going to Bradford Grammar School in Heaton and then later to Bradford School of Art.

But an escape from the oppression of post-industrial Northern England was always beckoning and after a stint at Chelsea College of Arts where the bright lights of London further awakened his creativity, it was the even brighter lights of Hollywood where he decided to make his home in the 70s. It was a place he loved and the inspiration for so many of his greatest works.

Hockney was a sunshine artist and in California, he had found his utopia. He loved the relaxed lifestyle, the weather and the way the light bounced of water and buildings to magnify everything in such striking, vivid ways.

He gave an identity to formless Los Angeles with his pools, palm trees and portraits – a Hockney world which was instantly recognisable, and which defined late-20th-century urban living.

His depictions of those sun-drenched Californian swimming pools, the tender intimacy of gay domestic life and the rolling fields of the East Yorkshire Wolds, were united by a profound love of observation.

He taught people to slow down and pay attention to the world around them, something he kept on doing well into his 80s, painting from his wheelchair right up until the end.

He once said: “To me, the world’s rather beautiful if you look at it. Especially nature and I’m always excited by the unlikely, never by ordinary things.”

Explaining the role of his work he added: “What an artist is trying to do for people is bring them closer to something, because of course art is about sharing. You wouldn’t be an artist unless you wanted to share an experience or a thought.”

Tightly focused, almost solely, on his art, Hockney just wanted to draw and paint and would often say it was his whole existence. He had devoted lovers and friends, and married his one-time assistant JP quietly a few years ago, but his abiding passion over more than 80 years was making paintings and his whole life is reflected on canvas and paper.

Hockney’s love for his Yorkshire hometown was further cemented with his connection to the 1853 gallery at Salt’s Mill, in Saltaire, – which was founded by his friend Jonathan Silver – and is home to one of the largest collections of his work.

Mill co-director Zoe Silver said Hockney was “proud” of his Bradford roots and of Yorkshire, adding that he was a “genius” who “never stopped loving life”.

Zoe said: “He loved Yorkshire and he loved the beauty of Yorkshire.

“He made people who had never been to Yorkshire love it because he wanted to celebrate it and saw the joy – all the work in recent years has been joy and he never stopped working.”

Councillor Chris Herd, Bradford’s lord mayor, called Hockney “one of Bradford’s most well-loved sons”.

“He was one of the most inspirational artists in the modern era and will leave a lasting legacy in the Bradford district and across the world,” he said.

“He painted the things he loved and we know that people will continue to be inspired by his artwork and his passion for life for many years to come.”

In a world of contemporary art, few artists manage to capture our imagination with as much finesse and ingenuity as David Hockney.

He was a man who preferred living in colour, whose mantra was always to love life and whose remarkable work and inspiration will long live on.