Since a mishap during a surgery, Ottawa resident Elizabeth Ostrowski has been a patient at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago for 10 months. In July, her son, James Ostrowski, brought a friend with him to visit.

The friend happened to be famous artist David Hockney, an English painter, draftsman, print maker, stage designer and photographer, based in Yorkshire, United Kingdom, although he also maintains a base in London.

James Ostrowski, now a Chicagoan, met Hockney in the mid-1980s when Ostrowski performed magic for him. Ostrowski has been the subject of Hockney's art several times. Hockney was a fan of Ostrowski's magic, so the two kept in touch over the years.

"He's a fascinating man," Ostrowski said. "He's recognized as the Picasso of our generation."

At Ostrowski's request, Hockney came to visit his ill mother.

"She was absolutely stunned," Ostrowski said. "She thought he was a very polite and kind man."

Hockney first drew Ostrowski, a 1978 Ottawa Township High School graduate, in the mid-1980s. He also was the subject in an art piece when he flew out to Hollywood to visit in the 1980s. He was the hitchhiker in a work of art called "The Steering Wheel," using cubism, which is a number of pictures that make up a total unit of a picture.

"Hockney felt photography was not being used to its fullest extent," Ostrowski said. "He wanted to introduce the element of time into photography. He would take a number of pictures and then compile them painstakingly. It had a choppy, cubic look to it. Each picture has a different time."

Ostrowski said one painting of him sold for $250,000.

"So I will hang somewhere in the world when I am dust, perhaps a museum," he said in an e-mail to The Times.

Do you want to send Elizabeth Ostrowski well wishes? Cards can be sent to her son, James Ostrowski, at 6654 N. Ashland Ave., Chicago, IL 60626.