<b>David Hockney</b>
(1966)
According to the art historian and biographer of Hockney, Peter Webb, David Hockney first read the work of the Greek poet C.P. Cavafy while attending the Royal College of Art in the early 1960s, producing two etchings and a painting in 1961 inspired by Cavafy’s poems. In 1966, Hockney was offered a commission by Editions Alecto to produce a series of etchings relating to Cavafy, to which he agreed without hesitation. Hockney selected poems related to Alexandria in Egypt and which clearly evoked a spirit of homosexual love. The basis for the work was produced during a two-week sojourn in Beirut where the artist made pen and ink drawings of daily life in the city. The resulting series shows a concern for and fascination with observed reality after the more abstract imagery of previous work such as the Rake’s Progress series of 1961-63
https://online-collection.historia.europa.eu/en/collection/item/9250/
Konstantinos Petrou Kavafis (Greek: Κωνσταντίνος Πέτρου Καβάφης [ka'vafis]; 29 April (OS 17 April), 1863 – 29 April 1933), known, especially in English, as Constantine P. Cavafy and often published as C. P. Cavafy (/kɑːˈvɑːfi/), was a Greek poet, journalist, and civil servant from Alexandria. A major figure of modern Greek literature, he is sometimes considered the most distinguished Greek poet of the 20th century. His works and consciously individual style earned him a place among the most important contributors not only to Greek poetry, but to Western poetry as a whole.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantine_P._Cavafy
Illustrations for Fourteen Poems from C.P. Cavafy
1966
Etching and aquatint on paper
34.5 x 22.3 cm
The Tate, London
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/hockney-illustrations-for-fourteen-poems-from-cp-cavafy-65477
This book was produced at a time in Europe when attitudes towards and laws on homosexuality were beginning to shift, especially among young people. While in some countries, such as France, it had never been outlawed in the 20th century, the legal situation varied across Europe. In the Netherlands, homosexuality had for a time been classified as a mental illness. In other cases, such as Ireland and Great Britain, homosexuality was against the law. In 1967, England and Wales decriminalised homosexual acts between men. The British artist David Hockney, in his early 20s as the 1960s dawned, was openly gay before decriminalisation. His illustrations of 14 poems by the 19th century Greek poet C.P. Cavafy explore the source material’s homoerotic nature, using scenes from Hockney’s life and circle. Perhaps not shocking to today’s audience, they were nonetheless created by the artist to defend his own way of living and form an expression of human rights in the changing world of the 1960s.
Kieran Burns
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