‘An evangelist for joy’: David Hockney remembered by Rachel Whiteread, Jeremy Deller and more

‘He made the wild milkshake of the world a place of granular human interest’ … Hockney’s A Bigger Splash, 1967. Photograph: David Hockney View image in fullscreen ‘He made the wild milkshake of the world a place of granular human interest’ … Hockney’s A Bigger Splash, 1967. Photograph: David Hockney ‘An evangelist for joy’: David Hockney remembered , Jeremy Deller and more Artists and cultural figures celebrate the great Yorkshire painter who could ‘make teabags and toothpaste glamorous’ – with a poem from a fellow Yorkshireman ‘David Hockney caught the look of the modern world’ David Hockney, revolutionary British artist, dies aged 88 Rachel Whiteread, artist: ‘I think about him every time I go swimming’ My earliest memories of modern artists were of David Hockney, Andy Warhol and Bridget Riley. I remember seeing a TV programme about David in the 1970s as a young kid and thinking “wow, is that what being an artist is like?” Because my mum was an artist but she wasn’t anything like that! Compared with Bridget Riley, who was very sort of cool, David seemed out there, embracing it all. He was charismatic and fashionable and very out and proud. He made being an artist look fun. I don’t know if it always is that fun, but he made it look that way. I actually think about him every time I go swimming. I might be diving to the bottom of a pool or looking up from the bottom, and it always astounds me how he painted water, and figures within water. The multitudes of layering and light and depth. Those LA swimming pool paintings were like such an alien landscape compared with cold, dreary London. They were my favourite period of his, but I also liked when he got really bold and colourful in the 1990s. And as a kid I loved his drawings: the lines, the draughtsmanship, the space … they just showed you what a master he is. He’s created such an incredible body of work. I can’t say I’ve loved all of it but I do love how he just never stopped painting. It was like he was breathing art. Jeremy Deller, artist: ‘He made an anti-smoking councillor hit the roof!’ David was a great role model – always up to something and enjoying it. He humanised technology in a way that few have managed. In 2009 he helped me by designing a banner titled The Unrepentant Smokers for a procession in Manchester.