David Hockney (b. 1937)

Some of Hockney's early prints are in fact versions of his paintings; the present print is related to the canvas of the same year entitled The Most Beautiful Boy in the World. However, far from being reproductions, these prints translate an image from the language of one medium into another. As Craig Hartley notes, the etching medium, combining scratchy etched lines and blotchy aquatint is 'perfectly adapted to transfer the style of his early oil paintings into a graphic language' (David Hockney Printmaking and Technique - I, Print Quarterly, September 1988, p.243).