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From David Hockney’s celebrated Six Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm portfolio, an image from the story of ‘The boy who left home to learn fear’. Hockney chose this story for its obscurity: It was the only story from the Brothers Grimm that he had never read. To illustrate this story, the artist drew from Goya’s aquatints, with their dramatic lighting, and from Magritte’s uncanny rock landscapes.
Hockney describes his formal influence for this etching: “…there was a line in the story that said ‘the man dressed as a ghost stood still as stone’, and I rather liked that idea. So that of course is a slight thing from Magritte, you know, where he made everything made of stone. And I thought, that’s a nice idea, I’ll just have everything – it’s supposed to be done so it looks like stone.”
Per the British Council: “In this tale a farmer had two sons. The older son was hard working and clever, the younger son whilst stupid and good for nothing was utterly fearless; indeed his only wish in life was to learn to shudder with fear. He was granted his wish and was sent to meet with ghosts and ghouls: first the sexton disguised as a ghost to spending the night with corpses taken down from the gallows to be warmed by a fire, all without a shudder of fear. His fearlessness came to the attention of the King who promised his daughter’s hand in marriage if the younger son could spend three nights in the haunted castle.
After enduring three nights of mayhem and horror without a shudder of fear, the younger son and princess married. Although he lived happily with the princess, he still wished he could shudder with fear. One night the princess’s maid crept into his room, pulled back the blankets and threw a bucketful of cold squirming fish onto the sleeping man who woke with a start, and a shuddered in fear.”
The sexton disguised as a ghost stood still as stone (Six Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm) 1969
Etching and aquatint on W S Hodgkinson paper watermarked “DH” and “PP”
Plate 17.5 x 12.7 in / 44.5 x 32.2 cm
Paper 24.75 x 17.5 in / 62.87 x 44.45 cm
Unique publisher’s copy aside from the edition of 400 books and 100 portfolios
