David Hockney is in lockdown at his house in Normandy in the South of France with his dog Ruby and two of his long-standing assistants, JP and Jonathan.
According to the BBC‘s Will Gompertz,
He is in the garden most days, drawing the spring awakening on his iPad… he shared 10 of his most recent images (including one animation), nine of which have never been published before, for us all to enjoy at this difficult time, along with his thoughts on the role of art in life.
The artist previously visited Normandy in the autumn of 2018 following the installation of his stained-glass window in Westminster Abbey. He thought it would be a good place to draw and paint the arrival of spring, something he’d done around a decade earlier in East Yorkshire. Those pictures, paintings, and films were the basis for a successful exhibition in 2012 at the Royal Academy in London.
He wrote in a letter to Gompertz,
“We found this house with a large garden that was cheaper than anything in Sussex”
I began drawing the winter trees on a new iPad. Then this virus started…
I went on drawing the winter trees that eventually burst into blossom. This is the stage we are right now. Meanwhile the virus is going mad, and many people said my drawings were a great respite from what was going on.
Why are my iPad drawings seen as a respite from the news? Well, they are obviously made by the hand depicting the renewal that is the spring in this part of the world.”
Thank you. Spring can’t come soon enough, if you ask me.
