David Hockney – too much in the Sun?

Introducing Rakewell, Apollo’s wandering eye on the art world. Look out for regular posts taking a rakish perspective on art and museum stories.

Last week, UK tabloid the Sun announced with great fanfare that it would be distributing a ‘free David Hockney’ in the following day’s edition. The grand old man of British art had indeed contributed his skills to the paper, subtly redesigning the paper’s logo on his iPad. ‘Once I had thought about the idea, it didn’t take me long’, he admitted.

The news quickly became one of Twitter’s top trending topics, with reactions ranging from the adulatory…

‘“Britain’s greatest living artist”? On the evidence of this…he has that title in the bag.’ says Jonathan Joneshttps://t.co/mYtp6smABr

— David Smith (@DavidSmithArt) February 5, 2017

To the flat out incensed…

Tomorrow David Hockney designs the Sun logo header FFS!!! What’s wrong with him?

— ARTIST TAXI DRIVER (@chunkymark) February 2, 2017

More than a few people, however, concluded that Hockney’s effort was an attempt to ‘troll’ the Murdoch-owned red top…

Hockney is the prettiest art troll ever it’s obviously a bum!! I ❤️ him! https://t.co/eYa1tb03Uh

— STUART SEMPLE (@stuartsemple) February 6, 2017

While others – in no way facetiously – disputed its authorship…

Real artist behind David Hockney’s logo for The Sun revealed. pic.twitter.com/X8eQeRuvzu

— HaveIGotNewsForYou (@haveigotnews) February 2, 2017

Perhaps the most accurate summary, however, belonged to Bendor Grosvenor on his Art History News blog: ‘The great man has doodled on the masthead. And that’s it.’

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