‘I worked every day’: How David Hockney fell in love with France during the Covid lockdown

Article excerpt

David Hockney, the British painter who died Thursday at 88, discovered a second artistic life in Normandy after settling there in 2019. During Covid lockdowns, when most of the world retreated indoors, the legendary artist threw himself into painting the French countryside with renewed intensity, working every day in solitude. The move marked a dramatic shift for Hockney, who spent decades as a restless cosmopolitan figure, constantly traveling between Los Angeles, London, and New York. In Normandy's quiet fields and changing seasons, he found something he'd been chasing across continents: a reason to paint nature again with fresh eyes.