The artist David Hockney HonFRPS who has used photography extensively in his work has has been appointed to the Order of Merit. Hockney was awarded The Society's Progress medal in 1988 and a Centenary medal in 2003 during The Society's 150th Anniversary year. 

The Order was founded by King Edward VII at the time of his coronation in 1902, to be ‘given to such persons, subjects of Our Crown, as may have rendered exceptionally meritorious services in Our Crown Services or towards the advancement of the Arts, Learning, Literature, and Science or such other exceptional service as We are fit to recognise’.

The Order of Merit is in the sole gift of the Sovereign and is restricted to 24 members as well as additional foreign recipients. 

Hockney has used photography extensively in his work starting with Polaroid collages. In 2001 in a television programme and book Secret Knowledge, Hockney posited that the old master artists had used the camera obscura in their work. Hockney argued that this technique migrated to Italy and most of Europe, and is the reason for the photographic style of painting seen in the Renaissance and later periods of art.

In a film by Paul Joyce shown on Sky Arts Hockney gave an insight into his forty-year love affair with photography which started as a child. Watching Laurel & Hardy films as a child, he noticed that the Californian light created a distinctive tone in the quality of American films. Hockney began to experiment with groundbreaking techniques in the 1970s, creating photo collages.

Photography soon became central to his investigations as an artist and Hockney on Photography showed how the artist redefined photography.