Hockney

A Bigger Splash (1967)

Three Trees Near Thixendale (2008)

Beverly Hills Housewife (1966)

This week has seen a bumper crop of postcards picked up when I’ve been out and about in town. I rarely buy new postcards, mainly due to London having a pretty uninspiring selection, but I’m always finding some beautiful cards for free in advertising racks and on shop counters. Advertising postcards are no longer the preserve of a slogan and a badly photo-shopped library image (although these do still exist), but instead show some ingenuity and integrity. The graphic artists involved are producing works of art and you can pick them up for nothing in your local cinema or coffee shop.

These postcards, which I found at the box office of Cineworld Haymarket, are part of a series produced to support the release of the new documentary Hockney, which is due out in the next few weeks. David Hockney is widely regarded as Britain’s greatest living painter, and certainly one of the greatest of the 20th century. His works are iconic and have been exhibited the world over for the last 50 years. The four postcards here show three of his artworks and an image for the film. They are brilliantly vibrant, like the originals, and this is carried through to the design of the postcard reverse, with bold blocks of primary colours. Each postcard also carries information about a live Q&A with the artist from his studio in L.A. which will be broadcast to cinemas,and a competition to create iPad art, in the footsteps of the man himself.