Howard Hodgkin

For an artist, time can always be regained . . . because by an act of imagination you can always go back.
—Howard Hodgkin

Gagosian is pleased and honored to present Last Paintings, an exhibition of Howard Hodgkin’s final works.

One of Britain’s most celebrated contemporary painters, Hodgkin composed powerful, expressive works that, while nominally abstract, bring representation, gesture, and affect into urgent relation. Last Paintings, presented at the Grosvenor Hill gallery in accordance with the late artist’s wishes, includes the final six paintings that he completed in India prior to his death, in March 2017, five of which will be exhibited for the first time. The exhibition includes more than twenty other paintings, never before exhibited in Europe.

In 1972 Hodgkin renounced working on canvas in favor of wooden panels and frames, some new and others sourced secondhand in India and Europe. The grain of the wood and the scars and scratches of the supports became integral to the paintings, affirming their physical presence and heft. Last Paintings attests to the immediacy of Hodgkin’s methods, as well as his intuitive understanding of the relationship between hand, eye, and memory.