Lightroom Live: Yuja x Hockney

Yuja Wang is one of the most compelling artists on the concert platform, famed for her dazzling technique and mesmerising stage presence. David Hockney is the elder statesman of art whose own youth was similarly eye-catching.

So art-lovers and music-lovers alike will not want to miss the return of a live performance in which the brilliant young pianist plays pieces that blend with the artworks in Hockney's autobiographical David Hockney: Bigger & Closer (nor further away and smaller).

Hockney's vivid works will unfold on floor-to-ceiling screens all around, with the virtuoso player at the keyboard. Audiences can choose to stand or sit, or even to add a glass of crémant to the occasion, and, thanks to an overhead camera, they can watch the intricacy of the player's dazzling fingerwork.

'The Arrival of Spring in Woldgate, East Yorkshire in 2011 (twenty eleven)' © David Hockney

The connection between Hockney's art and music is already established. 'The 50 minute experience is perfectly synchronised,' wrote Culture Whisper when the exhibition opened in February 2023, 'so that when he remarks that roads on maps can look like squiggles those same roads appear on the floor next to us, or as he mentions sketchbooks we’re suddenly enveloped on all sides by his hand flicking through dozens of them.

'While a section of his paintings of the theatre finds the marching characters come to life as a composition by Wagner booms throughout the space.'

Wang's programme is yet to be revealed, but expect plenty of aural fireworks to complement Hockney's irrepressibly vibrant colours as well as moments of intimate introspection. It all adds up to an evening that has that special 'Were you there?' quality. Highly recommended.

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Lightroom Live: Yuja x Hockney is at the Lightroom, Coal Drops Yard, 12 Lewis Cubitt Square, London N1C 4DY