20th of April, 2020 N1

David Hockney made this bright little scene in the spring of 2020, while staying at his farmhouse in Normandy during the pandemic lockdown. Rather than paints and brushes, he worked entirely on an iPad, drawing the same patch of countryside again and again as the season turned. The result is a sunny yellow path curving toward a green meadow, with a lone tree standing guard on the left and the corner of his stone house peeking in on the right, a couple of potted plants nestled beside it.

At over eighty years old when he made this, Hockney had lost none of his delight in color and everyday looking. The grass and gravel are built up from countless small dots and flecks, with specks of yellow tossed across the path like confetti, while the sky drifts by in fat, cartoonish clouds. Nothing dramatic is happening here, and Hockney would say that is the whole idea. This is simply a spring morning outside his door, set down during an anxious and lonely stretch of the world, a gentle reminder that there is still plenty worth noticing close to home.