David Hockney’s immersive display speaks to you ‘over your shoulder’

Months after his death, the voice of contemporary British artist David Hockney will guide audiences as they gaze upon walls emblazoned with colour, projecting his dreamy works at an upcoming art installation.

One of his final projects, the immersive exhibition David Hockney: Bigger & Closer (not smaller & further away), will make its Australian debut at Sydney’s Carriageworks in October, following successful runs in London, Seoul, Singapore, Shanghai, Manchester and Aranya in China, during which about 650,000 people made their way through.

The installation plays recordings of Hockney’s voice dating back to his 20s and animates a selection of his works. But the painter wasn’t initially convinced by the idea, according to the man who helped bring the project to life.

“We had to sort of persuade him to look back at past work,” said Richard Slaney, chief executive of Lightroom, which has partnered with Carriageworks to showcase the installation for its Australian debut.

“It’s not a full, complete biographical piece. But as a piece of legacy, I think what it does speak to is the philosophy behind this work about how to look at the world.”

Scale, light and perspective, elements from which Hockney, who died in June aged 88, drew inspiration across his long-spanning career, will be at the forefront of the installation.

It is the second major Australian Hockney exhibition to open in the months after his death, with the National Gallery if Australia’s David Hockney: Portraits in Print opening on September 5.

“It’s his work all around you, but also he’s narrating it, but in a way that your favourite relative would tell you something in an art gallery over your shoulder while you’re looking at that painting that brings it to life,” Slaney said.

“It’s not scripted. It’s just, ‘Oh look at that. Look at this thing, and I did that’ … he was fascinated by the idea of reimagining his work in this way.”

Opening on October 22 and running until January, the installation is broken into a series of chapters about different types of work in Hockney’s life, including one on opera paired with a score by Nic Muni.

“There are chapters about music,” Carriageworks chief executive Fergus Linehan said. “There’s a chapter about lines, so they tend to be more based around ideas within his work, although it does go through different periods, like when he was young and went to Los Angeles.”

Coincidentally, the historic Sydney venue had a room with the exact dimensions needed to host the installation: 23 metres long, 15 metres wide and 10 metres high.

Linehan’s vision for the installation aligns with one that he holds more broadly for Carriageworks, which he hopes can become “more of a public space”.

“We’re here to make this building as useful as possible, and to make it busy and consistently in use … particularly during the day – it creates a kind of constant flow of people coming in,” he said.

The 55-minute show is one anyone can enter at any time, Slaney said.

“The show runs in a loop. You enter at any time … It’s impossible to be late,” he said. “You can stay twice around if you want, and people do because you literally partake in it all in one sitting.”

Get the best of Good Weekend delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning. Sign up for our newsletter.