When David Hockney turns his gaze on the world, even lockdown turns luminous. In spring 2026, the Serpentine North in London will host the artist’s first exhibition at the institution—a free cultural event set to transform Kensington Gardens into a pilgrimage site for color, line, and sheer painterly joy.

At eighty-eight, Hockney remains insatiably curious, producing new work that fuses tradition with the digital frontier. Since 2020, he has been recording the shifting seasons of his adopted Normandy home on an iPad, transforming hedgerows, orchards, and skies into dazzling symphonies of light.

The Serpentine exhibition will feature these recent works alongside his nocturnal Moon Room landscapes and the blazing hues of the Sunrise series. Together, they remind us why Hockney has long stood as Britain’s most beloved chronicler of nature—someone who can turn the quiet of lockdown into an eternal spring.

A Year in Normandy: Tapestry and Time

The show’s centerpiece is the monumental A Year in Normandy, a ninety-metre-long frieze inspired by the Bayeux Tapestry. Like its medieval predecessor, it unfurls time itself—here not through battles and conquest, but through the daily metamorphosis of leaves, light, and weather.

Its inclusion is strikingly timely. Just as France prepares to loan the fragile Bayeux Tapestry to the British Museum, Hockney’s frieze arrives in London as a modern counterpoint—proof that epic narrative can still live in pigment and pixels.

Serpentine’s New Season

The exhibition forms part of the Serpentine’s ambitious 2026 programming. It follows a gaming-inspired installation by Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley at Serpentine North and runs parallel to Peter Doig’s painterly explorations across the lake at Serpentine South. Hockney’s show promises to anchor the season, offering both blockbuster appeal and contemplative depth.

Hockney’s Enduring Magnetism

The demand for Hockney is inexhaustible. His recent retrospective at the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris drew such crowds that hours were extended to accommodate the crush of visitors. In the past decade alone, his works have graced nearly every major London institution: the National Portrait Gallery (2023), the Royal Academy (2021), and Tate Britain (2017).

The Serpentine, surprisingly, has until now been absent from that list. This debut fills the gap—and does so with works that feel intimate yet monumental, playful yet profound.

There is something fitting about this being a free exhibition. Hockney, after all, has always painted with a democratic spirit—be it swimming pools in Los Angeles or iPad sketches of Normandy blossoms. His work belongs to the people, and next spring, Londoners will be able to wander into Kensington Gardens and step into his radiant vision of the world.