Scroll over, Beethoven! Music-lover David Hockney uses iPad to create this eye-catching tribute to legendary composer
- David Hockney painted Ludwig van Beethoven to celebrate his 250th birthday
- His drew the panting with a stylus on his iPad screen at his home in France
- A time-lapse video shows his technique of building up layers of colour and shade
One is arguably the greatest composer of all time. The other is Britain’s most celebrated living artist.
So perhaps it is no surprise that Ludwig van Beethoven has inspired the latest stunning painting by David Hockney.
The portrait, created by Hockney on his iPad and which the Daily Mail is showing readers in an exclusive first glimpse here, celebrates the 83-year-old artist’s lifelong love of music.
But there is another twist to the work, made to celebrate what would have been the 250th birthday this month of the German composer.
Celebrated British artist David Hockney, 83, has painted Ludwig van Beethoven to celebrate the German composer’s 250th birthday
The portrait was created by Hockney with an Apple Pencil stylus on his iPad at his home in France
Like Beethoven, Hockney suffers from deafness. And like the maestro, who was unable to hear some of his greatest works being performed, he still has music in his head.
Hockney, who first realised he was going deaf in 1978, wears two hearing aids, in different colours, which are designed to allow brilliant audio for music and for talking by phone.
He told the Mail yesterday: ‘I have always been an admirer of Beethoven’s work, which is why I chose to do this project.
‘I first heard Beethoven when I was about 12 and I went to the St George’s Hall in Bradford from school and sat behind the Halle Orchestra, John Barbirolli conducting Beethoven’s 7th Symphony. I was hooked straight away.
A time-lapse video shows how Hockney, a music-lover, built up layers of colour and shade
He told the Mail yesterday: ‘I have always been an admirer of Beethoven’s work, which is why I chose to do this project’
‘I often listen to a recording of Glenn Gould playing the Franz Liszt version for the piano of Beethoven’s 5th Symphony, it’s fantastic.
‘Of course I don’t go to the opera or concerts much these days, I’m too deaf now – but I’ve got a lot of music in my head, so I’m OK.’
Hockney created the painting with an Apple Pencil, a stylus that allows you to draw on the iPad screen, at his home in France in a collaboration with Apple Music. A time-lapse video shows how he built up layers of colour and shade.
‘The iPad painting is called Beethoven After His First Symphony, which he published in 1800 at 30 years old.
‘The iPad painting is called Beethoven After His First Symphony, which he published in 1800 at 30 years old’
‘It seemed fitting to celebrate his birthday by capturing him at that very significant moment in music history,’ he said.
Hockney has a long history of using his art with music. He designed sets for Mozart’s The Magic Flute at Glyndebourne in 1978 and for Puccini’s Turandot in Chicago in 1992.
Apple Music will feature the iPad painting and the time-lapse video of the creative process in its dedicated Beethoven room from today, alongside exclusive new recordings, performances, videos and playlists.