A remarkable inscribed and signed association copy of this study of the British painter, printmaker, and illustrator known for his portraits, still life paintings, and landscapes, inscribed by fellow British artist David Hockney, recognized as one of the most influential British artists of the 20th century. He has inscribed in black ink on the title to his close friend, the American jazz and popular music singer Tony Bennett, "For Tony with love / David H. London 8 Dec 04," adding "a great painter" above the printed name of the artist William Nicholson. Softcover,  173 pp. Very fine. 

Bennett's painting honoring good friend David Hockney, "Homage to Hockney," is on permanent display at the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown and Hockney's 1990 portrait of Bennett was featured in the album artwork for Bennett's Fifty Years: The Artistry of Tony Bennett (Columbia, 2004).

Tony Bennett began drawing chalk pictures as a child on the sidewalks of his hometown in Astoria, Queens but even when he became one of the premiere entertainers in the world, he found time to paint nearly every day. Painting under his family name of Benedetto, Tony Bennett's work has been exhibited in the galleries throughout the world and the United Nations commissioned his artwork on two occasions, including for their 50th Anniversary. Bennett began formal training as an art student at the School of Industrial Arts (now known as the School of Art and Design) in Manhattan and continued his studies with private studios and teachers throughout the years. A self-proclaimed "museum freak," Bennett was known to visit museums and galleries all over the world, especially during his extensive concert tours and his work as a painter has been featured in many international art publications.

The informal still-lifes, understated portraits and strikingly 'minimalist' landscapes of Sir William Nicholson have long been admired, but since the artist's death in 1949 his reputation has tended to be overshadowed by that of his son Ben, Britain's foremost modernist painter. In the past decades critical responses to William's art have alternated between astonishment at pictures that are often as fresh and glowing as the day they were painted, and bewilderment that a twentieth-century artist could be seemingly untouched by revolutions in art from impressionism on. Published to coincide with the first full retrospective in almost a quarter of a century - and the first in London since 1942 - this catalogue contains new texts by leading specialists on the many facets of Nicholson's work. A series of scholarly texts and catalogue entries accompany the broadest display of his painting ever published in colour, as well as an account of the artist's well-known and considerable body of graphic work.