Fall Pool with Two Flat Blues (Paper Pool 28): Paper Pulp work by David Hockney

  • Fall Pool with Two Flat Blues, Paper Pool 28, 1978, David Hockney

    Fall Pool with Two Flat Blues, Paper Pool 28, 1978 

    Coloured and pressed paper pulp 72 x 85.5

    Unique work

    ©David Hockeny

    Back to: paper Pool

     

    David Hockney's Fall Pool with Two Flat Blues, Paper Pool 28, 1978 presents one of the most restrained and atmospheric compositions within the Paper Pools series. Created in coloured, pressed paper pulp in collaboration with Kenneth Tyler at Tyler Graphics, the work depicts a swimming pool viewed from the end of a pale yellow diving board. Rather than focusing on ripples or dramatic movement, Hockney simplifies the water into broad fields of deep and light blue, creating a calm, reflective surface that contrasts with the dark landscape beyond and the subtle lavender border surrounding the pool.

     

    Widely regarded as a unique work, Fall Pool with Two Flat Blues demonstrates Hockney's ability to evoke mood through colour and composition alone. The smooth, uninterrupted planes of blue encourage the viewer to contemplate the quiet stillness of the water, while the handmade paper introduces subtle tonal variations that prevent the surface from appearing static. By reducing the composition to its essential forms, Hockney explores how minimal changes in colour, light and perspective can transform the perception of a familiar subject.

  • "It is an interesting formal problem; it is a formal problem to represent water, to describe water, because it can be anything. It can be any colour and it has no set visual description."

     

    - David Hockney

    Throughout the Paper Pools series, Hockney alternated between highly textured depictions of water and compositions built from broad, flat planes of colour. In Fall Pool with Two Flat Blues, this simplified approach creates a striking sense of tranquillity, demonstrating how the absence of movement can be just as visually compelling as the rippling, reflective surfaces seen in many of the other works.