Painted Environment II

Painted Environment II, released in 1994 in an edition of 25, is one in a series of three prints constituting the Painted Environment series, which depicts paintings set in rooms wherein the floor and walls are covered in patterns echoing those within the paintings themselves, thus blurring the distinction between where the painting ends and the surrounding room begins. In Painted Environment II, there are three canvases placed on easels: two larger ones set behind a smaller one in the foreground. The canvas on the far-left is that which dominated the composition in Painted Environment I. The abstract forms seem inspired by the cubist forms of Picasso and Braque, yet the colour palette is decidedly more expressive and vibrant. Across Hockney’s career, in which he has tackled numerous media and subject matters, Hockney’s principal obsession continues to be the challenge of representation: how do we see the world and how can that world of time and space be captured in two dimensions. Here, Hockney has set two-dimensional artworks, in a three-dimensional space, to then render that installation in a two-dimensional photo: collapsing the depth of the work once more. In this sense, Hockney’s Painted Environment series exemplifies the ways in which Hockney has continually played with the conventions of picture making.