Hockney Drawing Retrospective

British-born artist David Hockney has lived in L.A. since the 1970s. His luxuriant drawings of California, with their Mediterranean-like idyll of blue skies, palm trees and swimming pools, speak of alienation and spiritual emptiness. In this catalogue of a retrospective at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Hockney's diverse crayon, charcoal-and-ink drawings and watercolors include ruthlessly honest self-portraits, serene still lifes, nudes, street scenes, penetrating portraits and startlingly original vistas based on his travels in Egypt, Morocco, Paris and Hollywood. Also included are experimental works such as computer drawings, fax-machine images and Polaroid collages that combine photography with pencil sketches. In their accompanying essay to a rich, constantly new body of work, Luckhardt, a curator at the Hamburger Lunsthalle, and Melia, a British art historian, explore how drawing informs Hockney's approach to every medium, including painting and stage-set design. (Apr.)