Surfer- David Hockney

The above painting sold this week. I was taken by the scene as I saw surfers going down to the sea on Llangenith Beach one sunny day. Now I confess the nearest I ever got to surfing was listening to the Beachboys in the 60's. I have donned a wet suit in the days when we used to go dinghy racing. The hardest part of the day was getting the damned suit off.

After I finished the painting I noticed it clearly owes a bit to David Hockney whom I have admired since the 1960's. He is one of the best British  painters of the last 50 years in my opinion (although I confess I am not really taken with his recent work ). I like his paintings which were verging on becoming prints like Splash and so many more. In fact I believe he used to roll his flat colours and use masking tape...., anyway they are outstanding capturing that feeling of light and colour. I guess I must have had some of those images in my mind when I painted it. So yes this painting does owe something to the California of David Hockney from that time.

Link predictable I know

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fGaBv8pAMA