Book Description

‘The most charming... portrait of this ever-popular artist... so enormously appealing: good-natured, bluntly told, skimmed with Yorkshire humour... This is a story of sticky jam tarts, catching tadpoles in jars, torchlit conversations under the bedclothes, gossipy queues at the butcher’s and hikes among the hedgerows under swallow-strewn skies.’ The Telegraph‘Never worry what the neighbours think’ was the philosophy that Kenneth Hockney used to inspire his children – David Hockney, one of the world’s greatest living artists and siblings John, Paul, Philip and Margaret – to each choose their own route in life.The Hockney’s is a never before seen insight into the lives of the family by youngest brother John, from growing up in the Second World War in Bradford through to their diverse lives across three continents. Hardship, successes as well as close and complex relationships are poignantly illustrated with private photographs.With a rare and spirited look into the lives of an ordinary family with extraordinary stories, we begin to understand the creative freedom that led to their successful careers and the launchpad for an artist’s work that has inspired and continues to inspire generations across the world.