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‘Cold water about to hit the Prince’ 1969 from Six Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm.
Etching and aquatint in black on Hodgkinson handmade paper.
When selecting from over 200 stories collected by the Brothers Grimm, Hockney was drawn to what he described as the ‘psychological strangeness’ of the tales. They allowed him to explore the relationships and motivations of the characters and presented the challenge of depicting the supernatural and surreal.
Hockney’s technical mastery of etching was already evident in his re-imagining of Hogarth’s ‘A Rake’s Progress’, published in the early 1960s. The ‘Brothers Grimm’ suite shows a more refined approach to the medium, dispensing with colour and exploring the subtleties offered by intaglio techniques. Solid line and deep-biting aquatint give depth, with traditional cross-hatching and soft-ground plates providing texture and tone.
