This October, Ealing’s Pitzhanger Manor & Gallery unveils Howard Hodgkin: In a Public Garden – the most extensive institutional exhibition of original prints by the celebrated British artist to date.
Curated by renowned art historian Richard Calvocoressi, the show gathers around 60 prints spanning five decades of Hodgkin’s career, from 1966 to 2016.
Installed across the light-filled contemporary gallery and the atmospheric rooms of the historic Manor, the exhibition invites visitors into Hodgkin’s world of abstraction, memory and feeling. His prints — many hand-coloured and bordering on the painterly — blur the lines between disciplines, transforming Pitzhanger into a dynamic canvas of recollection and emotion.
Mr Calvocoressi said: “In the case of Howard Hodgkin, the term ‘prints’ is perhaps misleading. Many of them were hand-coloured by the artist or his collaborators and come close to being one-offs, like paintings; and as such, they make a powerful impact on their environment.”
He added: “Working from memory and imagination, Hodgkin created images of transience, in which ambiguous, dissolving forms are the pictorial equivalent of an autobiographical sensation or perception. I hope visitors will be both moved and exhilarated by this exhibition.”
Highlights include Venetian Views (1995), a rarely reunited series of lyrical cityscapes, and Swimming (2011), created for the London 2012 Olympics. The exhibition marks Hodgkin’s return to Pitzhanger, following his 2009 show in the space — long before its major restoration and reopening in 2019.
Tickets and more information about the exhibition can be found at: pitzhanger.org.uk/howard-hodgkin.
