The crowd at this weekend’s Glastonbury Festival will not only be enthralled by headliners including Lizzo and Arctic Monkeys, they’ll also be treated to a healthy dose of art. In addition to the event inaugural artistic program (with special guest star Jeremy Deller), Glastonbury will bring David Hockney’s new AI-assisted work to the video screens of its main stage tonight, June 23.
Created in collaboration with the Cultural Institute of Radical Contemporary Arts (CIRCA), the digital piece is based on Hockney’s 2014 painting The dancers V, part of a series on the same subject. The acrylic features a group of brightly dressed dancers holding hands in a loose ring, their kinetics mirroring that of Matisse. Dance (1909–10).
“I made them go around in a circle, then told them to stop and draw one, and slowly built it,” the british painter said on the creative process behind the work. “Now I’ve come out of the room and put them in a landscape, really on top of the world.”
From left to right: David Hockney, The dancers V (2014), and The dancers removed by AI Photo: © David Hockney and CIRCA.
Working on his iPad and using AI, Hockney has now removed the dancers from the work, leaving only the cerulean landscape. This new computer-generated piece has been developed into a one-minute video titled I HAVE LIVED IN BOHEMIAN BOHEMIAN IS A TOLERANT PLACEintended to spread the good word about harmony across bohemianism – an apt message for a work debuting at a festival born out of hippie culture.
“I really can’t believe we have the living legend that is David Hockney creating these beautiful paintings for our stages this year,” said Glastonbury Festival co-organizer Emily Eavis. “We are truly honored to show this work for the first time right in front of our very special guests on the Pyramid Stage tonight and then on our main stages this weekend.”
“David Hockney and Glastonbury are a perfect match,” added Josef O’Connor, Founder and Artistic Director of CIRCA.
David Hockney. Photo by Justin Sutcliffe.
This project marks Hockney’s second partnership with CIRCA, the first of which saw the artist’s digital work, Remember you can’t stare at the sun or death for very long (2021), splashed onto massive billboards in six major cities in May 2021.
Just as remarkably, I LIVED IN BOHEMIA records Hockney’s continued forays into new media, as part of his ongoing research into perspective. His latest adventure with AI follows his printed faxes, iPad Drawingsand 2022 immersive experience“Bigger and closer (not smaller and further).”
“It’s been 100 years since perspective was last discussed, along with Cubism,” said O’Connor, who also curated Hockney’s Glastonbury work. “I guess now that things are being generated by robots, we need to look even closer with entirely new eyes.”
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