'He was a genius' - Lifelong friend hopes Yorkshire memorial service is held for David Hockney

Peter Layton, a renowned glass artist in London, said he first met Hockney in the 1950s and they held a reunion only a few weeks ago in London when they reminisced about the fun times they enjoyed over the years.

Mr Layton, 89, who appeared as a guest on Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs recently, said: “I hope there is a memorial service for him. London will have one, no doubt, but I think Bradford should have one as well. If they do, I hope I get to hear about it.”

Mr Layton, who was raised in Manningham, Bradford, said they met up many times over the years in Bradford and in London. They chatted recently about their holiday to Scotland as young men when they climbed Buachaille at the head of Glen Coe.

He said: “We had a great time. We hitchhiked up there and slept in an open hut.

“We had a memorable time. We were fit young men. They were braver than me and really enjoyed climbing and watching the mist come down. It was a memorable trip.”

They both went to Bradford Art College.

“David went before me and all the students and lecturers were in awe of him,” said Mr Layton. “They saw, even when he was a teenager, that he was a genius.

“I remember seeing him in Bradford in the 1950s near the Penny Bank at the top of town. David was in morning suit with tails and a bow tie and looked a real gent.

“He was going to the Halle orchestra in Bradford and was working as an usher because it meant he got in for free.

“We often bumped into each by chance in London and where ever. I went to work in America at the University of Iowa and David had been there before.

“It was like I was following him, but I wasn’t. He made such a big impression in Iowa. He was larger than life, outrageous in a way.

“We met up in Sacramento in California for lunch. We weren’t in touch all the time but when we kept reconnecting and having a great time.

“The last time we met was a few weeks ago and looking back it was like a farewell but we didn’t think of it like that at the time.”

They grew up in Bradford just a few miles apart and their mothers were friends.

Peter - whose brother George, 84, was an actor in It Ain't Half Hot, Mum and an author and screenwriter - said: “I went to Belle Vue School and he was at the Bradford Grammar School but we had a mutual friend, David Johnson who I think now lives in York.”

He said he is a great admirer of Hockney’s work, his skill as a draughtsman and his use of colour, but he said it was ability to try new things which really makes him stand out.

“He was such a pioneer with iPads and what have you, I’m a Luddite by comparison – I can just about operate a mobile phone – but David was such a scholar and an innovator. There really should be a memorial service for him.”

Mr Layton is best known as one of the founding artists of the British studio glass movement which transformed glass into an art form rather than an industrial medium.