Artist David Hockney, the influential British artist who painted “A Bigger Splash” and other works, died on Thursday. He was 88
Hockney’s death was confirmed on Friday by his publicist, Erica Bolton, The New York Times reported. She said the artist died “peacefully” at his London home.
Hockney died a month shy of his 89th birthday, according to The Washington Post.
Hockney was born in northern England but lived much of his life in Southern California, The Associated Press reported. He used the backdrop of sun-drenched suburban views a major theme in his work.
While his art was conservative, Hockney was one of his era’s popular artists to create work with undisguised gay content, the Times reported. He was also one of the few artists to take a public stand against censorship of homosexual imagery.
Breaking News: David Hockney, the English artist whose colorful paintings restored the human form to art, defying the abstract schools of the mid-20th century, died at 88. https://t.co/VhtDiEA61P pic.twitter.com/GxUEltnWXf
— The New York Times (@nytimes) June 12, 2026
Hockney’s subjects for his artwork included shimmering swimming pools, kaleidoscopic portraits culled from dozens of small Polaroid photographs, and landscapes “drawn” with fingers on an iPad, according to the Post.
On Nov. 15, 2018, Hockney’s painting “Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures)” sold for $90.3 million at a Christie’s auction, Yahoo News reported. It was the highest price ever paid for artwork of a living artist, topping the $58.5 million bid for Jeff Koons’ “Balloon Dog (Orange)” in 2013.
Hockney was born on July 9, 1937, in the large British industrial city of Bradford, according to The Associated Press. He attended London’s Royal College of Art in 1959, and traveled to New York two years later, the Times reported.
Inspired by his visit, Hockney made prints based on William Hogarth’s series of paintings “A Rake’s Progress,” putting the 18th-century work into a 20th-century perspective.
Hockney’s artistic influences ranged from Renaissance portraitists to 19th-century English landscape painter J.M.W. Turner, the AP reported. He was also influenced by Pablo Picasso’s experiments in Cubism and 20th-century American pop art.
Hockney’s 1964 work, “Man in Shower in Beverly Hills,“ highlighted his fascination with the male figure and moving water.
His signature work, "A Bigger Splash“ (1967), captured the broken surface of a pool, the diving board protruding in the foreground.
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