Gregory Evans
Signed Print

While Hockney’s other portrait of Gregory Evans, his lover of ten years, from the 1976 Friends series shows the sitter at close quarters, here Evans is held at a distance. Formally dressed and sat in a modernist chair his appearance and setting belies his intimacy with the artist. The lack of background or props serves to emphasise this distance, and encourages the viewer to pay close attention to Evans’s clothes – he wears a very ’70s suit, complete with floppy bow tie – his cherubic curls and blank expression. Over the course of more than 50 years Hockney has depicted Evans in numerous sketches, paintings and prints. The two first met in 1971 and developed a strong connection which can be felt in other portraits of Evans as well as Small Head of Gregory. When Hockney was asked in an interview who the love of his life has been he replied, ‘Maybe Gregory’. Here however we see Evans more as a sitter than a subject of the artist’s affections, as if Hockney’s aim were to present an objective portrait devoid of intimate references on the surface. However on closer inspection we can see signs of his affection or at least close attention, perhaps in the softness of Evans’ curls, the slightly awkward pose of his hands and his ambiguous expression.