The Panama Hat
David Hockney British
Published by Brooke Alexander, Inc. American
Printed by The Print Shop
Not on view
Hockney has experimented with a variety of techniques, including digital printing, lithography, photocopying, and screenprinting, and apparatuses such as the fax machine. Etching, a printmaking technique akin to drawing, was particularly conducive to the illustrative style he developed in the 1960s, marked by an emphasis on crisp lines and images isolated within near-empty fields. Over the course of his long career, Hockney made numerous conventional portraits of Henry Geldzahler, his friend and curator of twentieth-century art at The Met. This portrait stands out among the group, as Gehldzahler’s jacket, pipe, and hat represent their absent owner.