I cannot underrate the importance of art to the Olympics. TM’s poster of a coveted, historic, iconic image from the 1984 Olympics proves my point. David Hockney (born 1937) created this image of a swimmer under the ripples of the water, printed in a limited edition of 750. Poster can be valuable, certainly in this case. After the final day of the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, the publisher destroyed all but 250 of these Hockey posters.
TM’s is hand signed: however, it experienced some water damage to the bottom. He wondered what it’s worth in the present condition and questioned if it will increase in value as we near the next Olympics in Los Angeles. About this creation, David Hockney wrote: “Water, in swimming pools, changes its look more than any other form. If the water surface is still, and there’s a strong sun, the dancing lines of the color of the spectrum appear everywhere.” The original poster is an offset lithograph at thirty-six by twenty-four inches printed on parsons diploma parchment paper. When purchased in 1984 the poster included a Certificate of Authenticity from the Olympic Committee.
In 1984 the Olympic committee commissioned fifteen artists from California to produce artwork used on lithographic posters featuring various sports. The Olympic committee wrote: “The posters commissioned for the 1984 Olympics contained an enlightened selection of the best American artists with an emphasis of those who work in Southern California.” But nothing produced in that year, in my opinion, compares to Hockey’s portrayal of a swimmer under those fabulous rippling waves. Hockney superimposes a grid system framed in twelve segments. Knapp Communications Inc. published the Hockney poster and Lana Lithograph, Inc. printed it. There’s so much dynamism and excitement in this official poster!
Controversial Artist David Hockney
To choose controversial artist David Hockney to create this 1984 poster was a landmark. Hockney, a key figure in the often maligned British Pop Art movement, represented America in this work because he moved to Los Angeles in 1964. Those familiar with his work know his backyard pool in Los Angeles often a theme, as did his beloved Dachshund Boogie. Hockney, an English painter, draftsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer, most influenced British artists of the 20th century. He’s known for landscapes, still lives, portraits, architecture with swimming pools, his dog, as well as stage designs for the Royal Court Theatre, Glyndebourne, and the Metropolitan Opera in New York City.
Hockney created his ‘Swimmer’ for the summer Olympics. Depending on a near perfect condition, the poster, if artist signed, sells for $3,000-4,000. Unsigned for $1,500-2,000. The water damage on RD’s poster appears significant enough that I believe the poster might sell for $1,000 or perhaps slightly less. A similarly themed Hockney poster, “The Diver,” created for the 1972 Summer Olympics, featured Hockey’s distinctive rippling, reflective water. Hockney created a very different 1984 Winter Olympic Games poster for the competition held in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia. This collage shows separate pieces of a photo montage of one subject, a spinning male figure skater. His rendering of movement is implied by a patchwork of photographic images of all angles of the skater’s spin. Visconti Art Lazo Vujic published that poster. They also commissioned artists of the stature of Twombly and Warhol for the 1972 games.
Hockney’s Work in Distinguished Public Collections
These include the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; the Art Institute of Chicago; the National Portrait Gallery, London; The Tate Gallery, London; the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; the Museum of Modern Art, Vienna; the Hirschhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.; and the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C. He currently lives and works in Normandy, France.
His achievements include the First Annual Award for the Archives of American Art. He’s listed on the Board of Trustees of the American Associates of the Royal Academy of Art Trusts, NYC. He was elected to the National Arts Association Los Angeles, and the Lorenzo de Medici Lifetime Career Award.