David Hockney In Front of House Looking West For Sale

In Front of House Looking West, David Hockney gives the viewer a clear picture of his beloved Normandy based 17^th century rustic country home, Le Grande Cour, that has been his full-time abode since 2019. This artwork is part of ‘The Arrival of Spring: Normandy’ series, which the artist worked on during the anxiety of the Covid lockdown, when the world came to a standstill. Focusing on themes of nature, memories, and surroundings, the artworks are representative of his love of the ‘quintessentially Norman’ village of Beuvron-en-Auge, where he can be at one with nature and create art, ‘we need art and I do think it can relieve stress.’

Hockney said in an interview: “It’s very, very beautiful, this part of the world. It’s unbelievably green. Everywhere we look is green. The horizons are just all trees: the only buildings we can see from the house are my studio or the barn. Otherwise, it’s just trees. We can’t see, quite, the sunset, because there’s some hills in the way. The sunrise I can watch from the kitchen window. Just as it’s coming up, a little gold bar comes over the horizon. It’s quite magic: you can only look at it for about two minutes, three minutes, then it’s too bright. I can see it in the winter from my bedroom, because then it’s moved south. It will move north until 21 June, then it will start its journey south again.”

Le Grande Cour is a 17^th century half timbered thatched cottage amongst a 12-acre plot and is the central focus of In Front of House Looking West. The house was in good condition and Hockney moved into it, whilst converting one of the two neighbouring barns into a studio (see In the Studio). The thatched cottage has a steeply sloping roof and we can see a row of small shuttered windows from the side of the roof allowing in some of the natural light of the bucolic French region.

The background is verdant: trees with bushy leaves, rich growing plants and lush grass walkways. A neat, winding gravel drive separates the vibrant greenery and parked alongside the thatched cottage is a battered looking four by four van.

In Front of House Looking West is an artwork evoking a charming simplicite; it immerses the viewer into Hockney’s idyllic life in his beloved Normandy in what he calls his ‘seven dwarves house,’ and encourages us to celebrate in the ‘happiness.’