"Do remember, they can't cancel the spring."
“The Arrival of Spring, Normandy, 2020” consists of paintings by David Hockney in his old country house in Normandy, just at the beginning of the epidemic. Hockney paintings, which were previously exhibited at the Royal Academy and Bozar in Brussels, are now at the Sakıp Sabancı Museum.
Gülten Akın has a poetry book called My Beloved Summer is Here Again, on the cover of which pink flowers bloom. In one of the poems in the book, the poet says, “…Summer has come to the clothes of my beloved with mothballs”. It is a poem, in fact, a poetry book that heralds summer throughout and says May is beautiful. Finally, when the weather got really warm and spring was definitely here, even if it wasn’t summer, I was thinking about this poem the whole time I walked in Emirgan and entered the Sakıp Sabancı Museum to see the “The Arrival of Spring, Normandy, 2020” exhibition. Welcoming the visitors at the entrance of the exhibition, “Do remember, they can’t cancel the spring.” his words riveted the joy of spring in me and opened the door to David Hockney paintings.
With the “The Arrival of the Spring, Normandy, 2020” exhibition, David Hockney paintings are coming to Turkey for the first time, which in itself creates excitement. The exhibition opens with a chart describing the life of the artist, who has used various directors of technology while producing his works of art. Next is spring. These “paintings” that Hockney drew with his iPhone and iPad; fruit trees, bushes, flower gardens, ponds and rivers, fields and landscapes extending to distant hills. Depicting the cycle of nature and trees from February 2020 to July, the painter shows the annual journey of spring to bare trees, buds, flowers and leaves dominated by every shade of green. That’s why the exhibition tells the story of spring from beginning to end.
Sakip Sabanci Museum Director Dr. Nazan Ölçer also says that the exhibition reminds us of the theme of “loving life”. Ölçer also expresses that he wishes this exhibition, which celebrates the rebirth of nature and spring, especially after two years when we were all confined to our homes and disconnected from the real world, would bring hope and joy for all of us. On the other hand, after visiting the exhibition, I have no doubt that these paintings, whose branches have come to spring, will give us hope.
“The Arrival of Spring, Normandy, 2020”, in which the repetitive journey of spring is followed every year, giving hope and vitality with the colors of spring, also brings together a different technique with art lovers by drawing all of them with iPad or iPhone. The exhibition, which will continue until July 29, includes 116 paintings and two video interviews with the painter. Presenting a happy manifesto, “The Arrival of Spring, Normandy, 2020” reminds us that the arrival of spirng cannot be postponed, and invites to chivvy hope and soothe hopelessness.
