| (b London, 6 Aug 1932). English painter, printmaker and collector. He studied at the Camberwell School of Art (1949) and at the Bath Academy of Art, Corsham (1950-54). He did not seriously exhibit until he was 30. His preference was for emotionally charged figurative groupings in which the figures appeared embedded in the matrix of the picture, as if growing out of their surroundings, such as the Interior of a Museum (1956-9; London, Tate). The often manic humour helped place Hodgkin in the climate of Pop art, although he was not directly associated with the movement; early subjects included Joe Tilson in The Tilsons (1965-7; ex-Stuyvesant priv. col., London), whose goggle eyes stare out from his own gaudy carpentered constructions. Hodgkin was always concerned to make the picture an object, and from 1970 he worked not on canvas but on assertive wooden supports, such as drawing boards or door frames. |
