- Artist or Maker
- David Hockney
England, Bradford, active United States, born 1937 - Title
- The Jugglers, 2012
- Date Made
- 2012
- Medium
- Eighteen-channel video installation
- Dimensions
- Duration: 22 minutes, 13 seconds
Installation: 81 × 288 × 7 1/2 in. (205.74 × 731.52 × 19.05 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.2016.100.1-.3
- Collecting Area
- Modern Art
- Curatorial Notes
In a 2013 interview, David Hockney maintained, “I am convinced that art and technology always go together—and always have, for centuries.” The Jugglers, Hockney’s synchronized, eighteen-channel installation, is a testament to his deep-rooted interest in the long-standing symbiotic relationship between art and science, not only due to the advanced audiovisual technology involved in the production and presentation of the work, but also through the optical experience it offers.
For decades, Hockney’s work has engaged different mediums and probed the boundaries between them. While doing so, the artist often reflects on the legacy of perspectival vision, which was invented in early modern Italy as a tool for organizing and conveying spatial relationships on a flat surface according to a horizon line or vanishing point. The Jugglers boisterously investigates the limits of this all-too-familiar mode of seeing by introducing several challenges to perception: the work integrates footage from multiple cameras that are placed side-by-side in order to allow a pronounced lateral extension of the picture plane. This frieze- or scroll painting-like expansion also benefits from the distancing effect of the high vantage point, as well as the painted ground (blue) and back wall (red). Altogether, they work toward eliminating vanishing points and a kind of spatial depth that would privilege the performers in the front row at the expense of the others. The imperfect transitions between each screen draw attention to the meticulous scaffolding behind Hockney’s vision and its limitations, just as his amateurish performers—whether parading to the tune of “The Stars and Stripes Forever” or performing in place—make evident in their most awkward moments the labor that goes into juggling.