A Black Cat Leaping

A boy sits in profile, his hands calmly placed together as if in a gesture of welcome, while a wild black cat springs towards him. The background is cross hatched, the pair’s shadows scribbled in. Detail is reserved for the texture of the wildcat’s fur, the curls on the boy’s head. He stares directly at his attacker and yet seems blank, or perhaps just fearless. The cat’s eye also seems vacant, giving us the impression that this is a half hearted assault, that there will be no real consequences, and reminding us that all this is born from a fabulation, a folk tale, specifically ‘The Boy Who Left Home to Learn Fear’.

David Hockney’s Illustrations For Six Fairy Tales From The Brothers Grimm are among the artist’s best known etchings. Conceived over three years and published in 1969 they showcase the artist’s ingenuity for composition, his charm as a draughtsman and his mastery of the medium of print. The prints were made for a book published by Oxford University Press which began as a print run of 2,000 and eventually sold more than 150,000 copies. Hockney took to the subject of fairy tales straight away; commenting on his love for the fairy tales he said, “They're fascinating, the little stories, told in a very very simple, direct, straightforward language and style, it was this simplicity that attracted me. They cover quite a strange range of experience, from the magical to the moral.”