美国国家公共电台 NPR Artist David Hockney Says The Drive To Create Pictures 'Is Deep Within Us'

Artist David Hockney Says The Drive To Create Pictures 'Is Deep Within Us' 

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David Hockney is one of the most important contemporary painters. He turns 80 next year, and he's busier than ever. He's known for bright paintings of Los Angeles, and he stars in a new documentary, will have a big London retrospective and has a new book. NPR's special correspondent Susan Stamberg asked the artist about his lifelong obsession² - looking.

SUSAN STAMBERG, BYLINE³: David Hockney is a major looker. He looks and looks, and then, in his work, makes us see what he sees. To Hockney, looking and showing are as old as time. Some caveman picked up a rock and drew an animal on the wall.

DAVID HOCKNEY: And then when they'd got the animal down, the person would have grunted⁴ or something and said, (grunting) I've seen something like that.

STAMBERG: Is making pictures, do you think, part of the DNA⁵ of being human?

HOCKNEY: Yes, yes. Very young people pick up a crayon and start to draw - don't they? - very, very young people. I think the idea of making pictures is deep within us.

STAMBERG: Today, trading crayons for smartphones, everybody's making pictures. OK. Maybe they're not that artistic⁶, but technically⁷, they're aces⁸.

HOCKNEY: You can't take a bad picture really. You can't take an underexposed picture. You can't even take an out-of-focus picture now. I mean...

STAMBERG: (Laughter) Right.

HOCKNEY: (Laughter) My father's pictures were - he used to take a lot of photographs, and they were always a bit out of focus and underexposed. He died just before the automatic camera came in and the automatic focus.

STAMBERG: Oh, no.

HOCKNEY: He'd have been in his element then.

STAMBERG: (Laughter).

HOCKNEY: Yes, he would.

STAMBERG: Hockney's "History Of Pictures" book is chock full of images, a few photos, but mostly reproductions of paintings he's loved looking at over the years. His favorite is a quick pen-and-ink drawing Rembrandt made in 1656, a family - mother, father, sister - hovering⁹ over a little child, teaching it to walk. Just a few strokes - the jot¹⁰ of a curve makes a shoulder; the flick¹¹ of the brush shows the father squatting¹², encouraging the child. Hockney thinks it's a virtuoso¹³ piece.

HOCKNEY: You see the tenderness of the drawing. But you also see the marks that made the drawing. You can look at the mother and see the little ragged¹⁴ dress she has on. But then you see the marks that were made to do this and how few there are and things like that.

STAMBERG: So minimal¹⁵, but universal.

HOCKNEY: Yeah. Any person anywhere in the world has seen something like this and experienced it - haven't they?

STAMBERG: He's crazy for Rembrandt, of course, and Picasso, his hero, and the late 16th-century Italian painter Caravaggio.

HOCKNEY: Caravaggio invented Hollywood lighting¹⁶.

STAMBERG: (Laughter) Oh, my goodness. There's a woman. She's cutting a guy's head off, "Judith Beheading Holofernes," 1599. And look at - why do you call it Hollywood lighting?

HOCKNEY: Well, it is Hollywood lighting. I mean, this is lighting that's not natural.

STAMBERG: No sun could shine so brightly on Judith's breast and then disappear to make such dark, velvety¹⁷ shadows right behind her. It's dramatic, unreal. Only movies can illuminate¹⁸ like that. Light and where it comes from is every painter's preoccupation. For David Hockney, light on water has particular fascination¹⁹.

What is it with you and water, David Hockney?

HOCKNEY: Well, water offers an interesting graphic²⁰ problem, it seems to me. Say, a swimming pool, the water is transparent²¹. How do you paint transparency? It has reflections and things.

STAMBERG: "A Bigger Splash," his best-known painting from 1967, shows a Californian swimming pool, tan diving board angling in from the bottom right, and rising from the aquamarine water, a lively, white splash. Someone just dove in.

HOCKNEY: I spent longer on the splash than on any other thing in the painting. I spent about a week painting it because it's painted with small brushes. I mean, I didn't want to just take a brush and splash it like that. I wanted to paint it slowly. And I thought then it contradicts the splash really.

STAMBERG: Yes. Oh...

HOCKNEY: Yeah.

STAMBERG: Because it took you so long to what, in life, took a second.

HOCKNEY: Yes, yes.

STAMBERG: Hockney once put big mirrors in the corners of a gallery hung with his sunset orange views of the Grand Canyon²². Reflecting the pictures made them more dimensional. Da Vinci told artists to look at all their work through mirrors. In reverse, the mistakes pop out.

When you go in a museum or a gallery, what's the first thing you look at in a painting?

HOCKNEY: You look at the surface.

STAMBERG: What do you mean look at the surface? Do you mean the veneer²³ that's on it, or what the brush stroke looks like or...

HOCKNEY: The paint - the paint itself. And then you might then see a figure. But I think, first of all, you see the surface.

STAMBERG: That is really a painter's answer. You or I would look first at the pear, the face, the horse. We're not Hockney. David Hockney believes painting can change the world. In the midst of all our miseries²⁴, he says, art lets us see the world as beautiful, thrilling, mysterious.

HOCKNEY: Well, I do see it that way. Yes, I do because I enjoy looking. I do. I mean, I do get a deep pleasure from looking. I can look at a little puddle²⁵ on a road in Yorkshire and just of the rain falling on it and think it's marvelous. I see the world as very beautiful. Yes, I do.

STAMBERG: David Hockney's new book, done with Martin Gayford, is "A History Of Pictures."

I'm Susan Stamberg, NPR News.

1 browser   

n.浏览者

参考例句：

• View edits in a web browser.在浏览器中看编辑的效果。
• I think my browser has a list of shareware links.我想在浏览器中会有一系列的共享软件链接。

2 obsession   

n.困扰，无法摆脱的思想(或情感)

参考例句：

• I was suffering from obsession that my career would be ended.那时的我陷入了我的事业有可能就此终止的困扰当中。
• She would try to forget her obsession with Christopher.她会努力忘记对克里斯托弗的迷恋。

3 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

4 grunted   

（猪等）作呼噜声( grunt的过去式和过去分词 )； （指人）发出类似的哼声； 咕哝着说

参考例句：

• She just grunted, not deigning to look up from the page. 她只咕哝了一声，继续看书，不屑抬起头来看一眼。
• She grunted some incomprehensible reply. 她咕噜着回答了些令人费解的话。

5 DNA   

(缩)deoxyribonucleic acid 脱氧核糖核酸

参考例句：

• DNA is stored in the nucleus of a cell.脱氧核糖核酸储存于细胞的细胞核里。
• Gene mutations are alterations in the DNA code.基因突变是指DNA密码的改变。

6 artistic   

adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的

参考例句：

• The picture on this screen is a good artistic work.这屏风上的画是件很好的艺术品。
• These artistic handicrafts are very popular with foreign friends.外国朋友很喜欢这些美术工艺品。

7 technically   

adv.专门地，技术上地

参考例句：

• Technically it is the most advanced equipment ever.从技术上说，这是最先进的设备。
• The tomato is technically a fruit,although it is eaten as a vegetable.严格地说，西红柿是一种水果，尽管它是当作蔬菜吃的。

8 aces   

abbr.adjustable convertible-rate equity security (units) 可调节的股本证券兑换率；aircraft ejection seat 飞机弹射座椅；automatic control evaluation simulator 自动控制评估模拟器n.擅长…的人( ace的名词复数 )；精于…的人；（ 网球 ）（对手接不到发球的）发球得分；爱司球

参考例句：

• The local representative of ACES will define the local area. ACES的当地代表将划定当地的范围。 来自互联网
• Any medical expenses not covered by ACES insurance are the sole responsibility of the parents. 任何ACES保险未包括的医疗费用一律是父母的责任。 来自互联网

9 hovering   

鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫

参考例句：

• The helicopter was hovering about 100 metres above the pad. 直升机在离发射台一百米的上空盘旋。
• I'm hovering between the concert and the play tonight. 我犹豫不决今晚是听音乐会还是看戏。

10 jot   

n.少量；vi.草草记下；vt.匆匆写下

参考例句：

• I'll jot down their address before I forget it.我得赶快把他们的地址写下来，免得忘了。
• There is not a jot of evidence to say it does them any good.没有丝毫的证据显示这对他们有任何好处。

11 flick   

n.快速的轻打，轻打声，弹开；v.轻弹，轻轻拂去，忽然摇动

参考例句：

• He gave a flick of the whip.他轻抽一下鞭子。
• By a flick of his whip,he drove the fly from the horse's head.他用鞭子轻抽了一下，将马头上的苍蝇驱走。

12 squatting   

v.像动物一样蹲下( squat的现在分词 )；非法擅自占用（土地或房屋）；为获得其所有权；而占用某片公共用地。

参考例句：

• They ended up squatting in the empty houses on Oxford Road. 他们落得在牛津路偷住空房的境地。
• They've been squatting in an apartment for the past two years. 他们过去两年来一直擅自占用一套公寓。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 virtuoso   

n.精于某种艺术或乐器的专家，行家里手

参考例句：

• He was gaining a reputation as a remarkable virtuoso.作为一位技艺非凡的大师，他声誉日隆。
• His father was a virtuoso horn player who belonged to the court orchestra.他的父亲是宫廷乐队中一个技巧精湛的圆号演奏家。

14 ragged   

adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的

参考例句：

• A ragged shout went up from the small crowd.这一小群人发出了刺耳的喊叫。
• Ragged clothing infers poverty.破衣烂衫意味着贫穷。

15 minimal   

adj.尽可能少的，最小的

参考例句：

• They referred to this kind of art as minimal art.他们把这种艺术叫微型艺术。
• I stayed with friends, so my expenses were minimal.我住在朋友家，所以我的花费很小。

16 lighting   

n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光

参考例句：

• The gas lamp gradually lost ground to electric lighting.煤气灯逐渐为电灯所代替。
• The lighting in that restaurant is soft and romantic.那个餐馆照明柔和而且浪漫。

17 velvety   

adj. 像天鹅绒的, 轻软光滑的, 柔软的

参考例句：

• a velvety red wine 醇厚的红葡萄酒
• Her skin was admired for its velvety softness. 她的皮肤如天鹅绒般柔软，令人赞叹。

18 illuminate   

vt.照亮，照明；用灯光装饰；说明，阐释

参考例句：

• Dreams kindle a flame to illuminate our dark roads.梦想点燃火炬照亮我们黑暗的道路。
• They use games and drawings to illuminate their subject.他们用游戏和图画来阐明他们的主题。

19 fascination   

n.令人着迷的事物，魅力，迷恋

参考例句：

• He had a deep fascination with all forms of transport.他对所有的运输工具都很着迷。
• His letters have been a source of fascination to a wide audience.广大观众一直迷恋于他的来信。

20 graphic   

adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的

参考例句：

• The book gave a graphic description of the war.这本书生动地描述了战争的情况。
• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons.用图标来区分重要的文本项。

21 transparent   

adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的

参考例句：

• The water is so transparent that we can see the fishes swimming.水清澈透明，可以看到鱼儿游来游去。
• The window glass is transparent.窗玻璃是透明的。

22 canyon   

n.峡谷，溪谷

参考例句：

• The Grand Canyon in the USA is 1900 metres deep.美国的大峡谷1900米深。
• The canyon is famous for producing echoes.这个峡谷以回声而闻名。

23 veneer   

n.(墙上的)饰面，虚饰

参考例句：

• For the first time her veneer of politeness began to crack.她温文尔雅的外表第一次露出破绽。
• The panel had a veneer of gold and ivory.这木板上面镶饰了一层金和象牙。

24 miseries   

n.痛苦( misery的名词复数 )；痛苦的事；穷困；常发牢骚的人

参考例句：

• They forgot all their fears and all their miseries in an instant. 他们马上忘记了一切恐惧和痛苦。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• I'm suffering the miseries of unemployment. 我正为失业而痛苦。 来自《简明英汉词典》

25 puddle   

n.(雨)水坑，泥潭

参考例句：

• The boy hopped the mud puddle and ran down the walk.这个男孩跳过泥坑，沿着人行道跑了。
• She tripped over and landed in a puddle.她绊了一下，跌在水坑里。