Howard Hodgkin. In conversation - ACE121.4

Sylvester asks again about the possibility of spoiling a painting "by going too far". Hodgkin says that he has often "wrecked" paintings but has always been able to "get it back", by going back to the subject because his paintings go wrong when they lose their meaning. Hodgkin and Khakhar consider racing to complete erotic paintings; part with Hodgkin’s VO continuing to talk about recuperating a painting, and saying his work "is resolved in terms of the picture" rather than necessarily being "about feeling". Interview continues with Hodgkin saying that the impetus of the resolution, nonetheless, comes from the feeling. Night. Hodgkin at party with Haridas Swali. Caption: "Dinner at Smith Square 1975-79." The painting. In response to a statement by Sylvester, Hodgkin says that he thinks of collectors as artists, and, VO Baroda Museum and Art Gallery, Sayajibaug (including views of room of European painting and sculpture), talks about Mario Praz’s book, The House of Life. At Swali’s house in Mumbai. Hodgkin’s VO talks of his fascination with other people’s homes, particularly in the relationship between collectors and their objects. Swali shows him a painted wooden panel, several religious sculptures (including one of Kubera, or Jambhala, god of wealth; Swali jokes about liking fat men) and some paintings. Hodgkin’s VO on "the relationship between people and their objects" continues. Exhibits in the Baroda Museum; Hodgkin’s VO says that he finds it "fascinating and fun" because "the installation and the collection is so eccentric and so wasteful, [having] something of the character of some vast Victorian private house…". Visitors touring the Museum; exhibits; Hodgkin’s VO saying that he finds depressing the "totally twentieth century convention of hanging pictures in one line as far as possible" (though he wants that done with his work).