The Late Works...

...is a small free exhibition that opened this month at the National Gallery showing artworks by the late Richard Hamilton (1922-2011), primarily from the last decade of his life. Here's some of my favourites...

For Design for 'The Artists Eye' exhibition poster (1978) (below) Hamilton uses a print of Jan van Eyck's The Arnolfini Portrait (1434) and places an unfinished modern canvas on an easel in the foreground. I like the way paint seems to drip down from that canvas out of the picture onto the white border framing it.

 

 

 

 

 



In Lobby (1985-7) (below) beautifully detailed reflections are visible on the clean and clinical mirrored glass pillars in the centre and right of the picture.

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A great contrast is created in Bathroom Fig 1 II (below) between the blurred figure in motion in the foreground and the clean, sharp lines and flat colours all around her.

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

Hamilton created different surface textures in Bathroom Fig 2 II (2005-6) (below), especially in the bottom half of the picture.

 

 



 

 

 

 

 

 



As can be seen in other works on display, Hamilton sometimes painted onto prints of photographs. The impeccably painted artist in the foreground of Portrait of a Woman as an Artist (2007) (below) is another example of this.

 

 



 

 

 

 

 

 



http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/whats-on/exhibitions/richard-hamilton-the-late-works