Los Angeles Modern Auctions (LAMA)

Decades before the tones and beeps of dial-up became a household soundtrack, the fax machine allowed anyone to copy and transmit physical documents from one place to another—almost like magic. While the fax—short for facsimile—machine may most typically be associated with the relatively dry goings-on of offices and bureaucratic enterprise, David Hockney was among those who saw this new technology as a marvel filled with creative potential. In the 1980s, having already broached the Xerox machine as a tool of artistic production, Hockney began to create works explicitly for transmission by fax, which he proceeded to send from Southern California to friends and galleries around the world. When Hockney was invited to participate in the 1989 São Paulo Biennale, he chose to do so by fax and contributed more than 30 works to the event. Gathered together here, this collection of Hockney facsimile drawings arrives from Yunique Studio under the auspices of James Yohe, former director of André Emmerich Gallery, and represents the full offering that Hockney sent to Brazil at the close of the 1980s, just as the modern internet was beginning to take shape. 

“Are they art or are they artifacts?”

“Are they art or are they artifacts?” Yohe poses of Hockney’s fax drawings. They are, of course, both. In the fax machine, Hockney found several elements to weave into his already-renowned contemporary art practice: “the wonderful machine,” as he once called it, allowed him to expand his embrace of emerging technology and create artworks that could be democratically disseminated while also staying true to the aesthetic of fragmentation, compositing, and collage that distinguished earlier works like Pearblossom Hwy., 11th-18th April 1986 #1 and Pearblossom Hwy., 11th-18th April 1986 #2. Two years after making these groundbreaking photocollages, in 1988, Hockney semi-officially founded what he called The Hollywood Sea Picture Supply Co.—his fax art “company.” “Many of [these works] were made up from paintings of the sea,” Hockney explained, “stretched on one machine, reduced in another way, crammed in, pasted up, made into a collage and then into a fax.”

The Hollywood Sea Picture Supply Co. issued its product from one of two locations: either Hockney’s home in Malibu or the Hollywood Hills. Accordingly, every page of his faxed works bears not only a timestamp but also the name of its location of origin: “DH at the beach” or “DH in the hills.” Many who received early fax prints were shocked by the quality of the image: “I began sending them out to various people who immediately responded by asking how I got such clear pictures from a fax machine,” Hockney explained, “There’s no such thing as a bad printing machine.” Describing his process, he noted “ To make half-tones, for instance, you don't use washes for something to look like a wash, you use opaque gray; the machine read the opaque gray and made the dots itself.”

Hockney shared many of his fax works widely, taking joy in how easily he could gift his artwork to friends—especially, as Yohe recalls, friends that might not otherwise be able to afford a Hockney. “It's touching the way David wanted to share them with people,” says Yohe. As much as Hockney delighted in the facsimiles, he did not initially intend to show them at the São Paulo Biennial. The first plan was to exhibit paintings, but finding willing lenders proved to be an obstacle as the biennial came on the heels of David Hockney: A Retrospective at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Thus, Hockney pivoted 180 degrees, offering to send unconventional facsimile works of ordinary ink and paper in lieu of original paintings loaned from esteemed collectors. “We got a map of the room in São Paulo,” Hockney explained, “and made an exact model of it so that we could make some faxes specifically to fit the wall.” In a letter to São Paulo Biennial curator Carlos von Schmidt, David Hockney’s assistant Richard Schmidt detailed the process for receiving the artworks, one fax at a time, and reassembling and mounting them, adding, “We are looking forward to a stunning and revolutionary exhibition.” 

Having created new works specifically for the biennial, another challenge presented itself: the Brazilian phone lines, in the end, were not able to successfully receive the high volume of faxes. Ultimately, the works would be faxed from one room to another in a Los Angeles hotel and then carried in suitcases by an assistant to São Paulo, where the works were reassembled and mounted by Henry Geldzahler. The reception to Hockney’s unprecedented works was varied: “The fax show in Brazil caused quite a stir,” Hockney said, "But many people saw the philosophical side, the interesting side, the use of printing to make original works.” Among those who appreciated Hockney’s vision was Jonathan Silver, who that same year organized a Hockney fax-art event at the Salts Mill in Saltaire, Yorkshire. For this occasion, Hockney faxed Tennis—a version of which is offered in the Yunique Studio Collection— from California to England in 144 pieces; at the Salts Mill, “Ride of the Valkyries” played while bustling assistants received the work from four fax machines and set to work affixing them to the wall. 

As happens with both art and artifacts, the meaning and significance of Hockney’s facsimile drawings have changed with time. The explosion of the internet over the course of the past three decades has made the fax machine a relic of a communication era past, shrouded in nostalgia and maybe even mystery, depending on one’s age. Yet Hockney’s creations are still here with us today, surprisingly durable works produced on the cusp of a historic juncture in global communications and connectivity. Though the precise coordinates of the intersection of art and technology have changed, Hockney’s fax drawings illuminate the value of creative adaptability, an extraordinary instance of art persisting through momentous change.