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The 13 Best David Hockney Paintings of All Time

By YPB Team

David Hockney is one of the most celebrated artists of the 20th and 21st centuries, known for his vibrant California pool paintings, intimate British portraiture, and pioneering digital works. These are the masterpieces that define his extraordinary career.

  1. A Bigger Splash — ranked #11
    A Bigger Splash
    Hockney's iconic 1967 California pool painting capturing the frozen moment of a splash against a serene blue sky, his most reproduced and recognizable image.
    1000pts
  2. Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy — ranked #22
    Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy
    The 1970-71 double portrait of fashion designer Ossie Clark and his wife Celia Birtwell with their white cat Percy, now housed at Tate Modern and considered a masterpiece of British portraiture.
    862pts
  3. Garrowby Hill — ranked #33
    Garrowby Hill
    The 1998 landscape painting of the winding Yorkshire road, its bold greens and yellows marking Hockney's triumphant return to painting English landscapes after decades in California.
    665pts
  4. Pearblossom Highway — ranked #44
    Pearblossom Highway
    The 1986 photo-collage masterwork assembled from hundreds of individual photographs of a California desert intersection, a defining example of his 'joiner' composite technique.
    596pts
  5. We Two Boys Together Clinging — ranked #55
    We Two Boys Together Clinging
    The 1961 early painting inspired by Walt Whitman's poetry, a raw, expressionistic work that openly celebrated gay love at a time when it was still illegal in Britain.
    517pts
  6. The Arrival of Spring in Woldgate — ranked #66
    The Arrival of Spring in Woldgate
    The monumental 2011 work created on an iPad and transferred to large-scale print, capturing the explosive emergence of spring in the East Yorkshire landscape.
    423pts
  7. Self-Portrait with Red Braces — ranked #77
    Self-Portrait with Red Braces
    The 2003 self-portrait depicting Hockney in his studio wearing bold red braces, one of his most celebrated late-career portraits demonstrating his continued mastery of likeness.
    423pts
  8. The Splash — ranked #88
    The Splash
    The 1966 predecessor to A Bigger Splash that first explored Hockney's fascination with representing water, featuring the same serene California pool beneath a warm sky.
    310pts
  9. Mulholland Drive: The Road to the Studio — ranked #99
    Mulholland Drive: The Road to the Studio
    The massive 1980 painting of the curving Los Angeles highway, a joyful, kaleidoscopic celebration of the California landscape and the experience of driving through it.
    310pts
  10. Woldgate Woods — ranked #1010
    Woldgate Woods
    One of his famous East Yorkshire landscape series painted 2006-2007, depicting a wooded lane across the changing seasons with Hockney's signature bold, joyful color palette.
    310pts
  11. My Parents — ranked #1111
    My Parents
    The 1977 double portrait of Hockney's parents Kenneth and Laura, a tender yet formal composition reflecting on mortality, love, and the passage of time.
    310pts
  12. Beverly Hills Housewife — ranked #1212
    Beverly Hills Housewife
    The large-scale 1966-67 acrylic depicting a woman in front of a modernist California home surrounded by manicured garden and pool, capturing the glamour of LA affluence.
    310pts
  13. Portrait of Nick Wilder — ranked #1313
    Portrait of Nick Wilder
    The 1966 portrait of his friend Nick Wilder standing in his Hollywood pool, one of the California swimming pool series that defined Hockney's early reputation.
    0pts

#20th-century15#art26#portrait38#classics476#british118

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