Key Takeaways
- Snow is up 451% since 2017 and has set a new floor at £55,000–£65,000
- Rain hasn't appeared at auction since October 2023. Supply, not demand, is the constraint
- Lightning is the series' fastest-moving print right now, up from £6k to £22k in under a decade
- Only one complete set has come to auction in ten years
- Four associated works – Dark Mist, Snow Without Colour, and two Lightning studies – sit outside the formal six but share the series' visual language and are increasingly collected alongside it.
The Weather Series Collection Summary 2017–2026
David Hockney Snow Print Value
Among the six prints in The Weather Series, Snow has produced the most consistent market record. With ten auction appearances across the decade – the highest of any work in the series – it has moved from a hammer price of £11,700 in 2017 to £65,000 (£81,900 with fees) in 2025, representing a 451% increase in eight years. Crucially, that appreciation has not been driven by a single outlier result. Two 2025 sales, both at major London auction houses, achieved hammer prices of £65,000 and £55,000 respectively, placing the work among the strongest performers in the series.
The trajectory from 2020 is particularly notable. Snow broke through £40,000 in early 2020, establishing a new pricing benchmark for the work. Subsequent sales consolidated around that level before advancing further in 2024 and 2025. Unlike more volatile works that experience short-lived peaks, Snow has shown a gradual and consistent progression in value over several auction cycles.
For sellers, Snow presents one of the strongest cases for consignment within The Weather Series. The work combines the highest level of market participation in the group with a proven ability to absorb higher price points. At the same time, supply remains limited, with only two examples appearing at auction in the past two years.
David Hockney Sun Print Price and Market Demand
Sun is the most actively traded print in the series, with eleven auction appearances over the decade. Where Snow leads on price appreciation, Sun leads on liquidity – and increasingly, on geographic reach. Three 2025 sales spanned London, the US, and Japan, with the Japanese result of £49,741 (£57,948 with fees) setting a new record for the print. That breadth of buyer geography proves this is not a market confined to a single collector base.
Sun's price history shows a clear step-change after 2020. Before that, it consistently traded in the £10,000–£15,000 range. In late 2021, Bonhams achieved £48,000 (£60,000 with fees) – more than three times the prior average – effectively resetting expectations. Since then, it has traded consistently in the £36,000–£50,000 band across six consecutive appearances, with no reversion to earlier levels.
For buyers, Sun is the most accessible entry point into the upper tier of the series – consistently available and now proven across multiple geographies. That breadth also gives sellers meaningful flexibility in placement.
Is David Hockney's Lightning Print Undervalued?
Lightning is the most under-discussed print in The Weather Series – and one of the most interesting from a buyer’s perspective. Before 2023, it had appeared at auction only twice in a decade, trading at around £6,000. Then, in 2023, two results near £15,000 marked a significant shift in the market, representing an increase of more than 140% from its earlier pricing level.
In 2025, Lightning appeared three times within nine months, progressing from £13,000 in March to £22,500 in October across both London and New York – a 73% increase within a single year. The progression suggests a market recalibrating its expectations of value rather than responding to a single exceptional sale. The first 2026 result, at £22,000 (£28,380 with fees), indicates that the higher pricing level has so far been sustained.
At its current price level, Lightning trades at roughly a third of Snow‘s hammer price and remains materially below Mist. The disparity is notable given the work’s recent momentum and suggests the market has yet to establish a clear consensus on its relative position within the series. For buyers, it remains one of the few works in The Weather Series where valuation benchmarks are still being formed.
David Hockney Rain Print Auction Record
Rain is the highest-valued print in The Weather Series and the rarest at auction. Just four public sales have been recorded over the past decade – in 2017, 2022, and twice in 2023 – representing an exceptionally limited auction history. Despite that scarcity, values have risen significantly, from a hammer price of £32,000 in 2017 to a record £89,278 (£107,133 with fees) in 2022, an increase of almost 180% in five years.
The work’s most recent auction activity came in 2023, when two examples sold within weeks of one another for £72,000 and £82,000 respectively. The consistency of those results is notable, providing a clear indication of where the market had settled following the 2022 record. Rather than an isolated peak, the sales suggest buyers were willing to compete for the work at substantially higher levels than those achieved prior to 2022.
For collectors and sellers alike, Rain occupies a unique position within the series. While Snow benefits from a deeper transaction history and Lightning is still establishing its market profile, Rain derives much of its strength from scarcity. With so few public transactions available as reference points, price discovery is inherently limited, increasing the importance of private-market activity when examples do become available.
David Hockney Mist and Wind Print Prices
Mist has appeared at auction eight times over the past decade, making it one of the more frequently traded works in The Weather Series. Prices have generally ranged between £28,000 and £41,000, although the current auction record of £41,366 (£52,534 with fees), achieved in 2025, was for a Special Proof, which typically carry a premium. Excluding proof variants, auction results indicate a relatively stable market centred around the £30,000 level.
Wind is the least established of the six prints from The Weather Series, having first appeared at auction only in 2023. Three sales that year achieved prices between £9,000 and £16,500, followed by a record 2024 result of £19,092 (£24,056 with fees). Although its auction history remains limited, the available results point to increasing buyer willingness to transact at higher price levels.
With just four auction appearances in the last ten-year period, Wind has the shortest public sales history in the series. As a result, valuation benchmarks are less established than those of works such as Snow, Mist, or Rain, and future auction results will play an important role in defining its position within the hierarchy of the series.
David Hockney The Weather Series Complete Set Value
October 2023 marked a defining moment for The Weather Series. Sotheby’s London offered five of the six individual prints alongside a complete set – the only complete set to appear at auction in more than a decade. The set achieved a hammer price of £181,400 (£228,651 with fees), compared with £91,000 when another complete set sold in 2012, representing a 99% increase at hammer over eleven years.
The auction’s impact extended beyond the complete set itself. By bringing much of the series to market at once, it established fresh pricing benchmarks across several prints, including Wind and Lightning, which had previously traded only rarely at auction. It also underscored the scarcity of complete sets: only two have appeared publicly since 2012, making individual acquisitions the primary route through which collectors build the series.
The broader market responded accordingly. Sixteen prints sold in 2023, generating more than £594,000 in hammer value – the highest annual turnover recorded for the series and four times the volume seen in 2022. Activity fell back to four sales in 2024 before rebounding to nine sales and more than £353,000 in value during 2025. The sharp fluctuations in annual sales volume suggest that market activity is constrained more by supply than demand. When examples come to market, collectors have generally shown a willingness to absorb them at increasingly higher price levels.
Dark Mist and Snow Without Colour: The Associated Weather Series Prints
Four works sit outside the formal six-print suite but are closely associated with The Weather Series: Dark Mist, Snow Without Colour, Study of Lightning (Medium), and Small Study of Lightning. Produced during the same period and sharing many of the visual characteristics of the series, they have developed a distinct market alongside the core set.
Of the four, Dark Mist has delivered the strongest price growth, rising from £7,600 in 2017 to £22,300 in 2023. Snow Without Colour occupies a higher value tier, reaching £30,000 in 2020 and subsequently trading in the £27,000–£28,000 range. Neither work has appeared at auction in recent years, limiting the availability of current pricing benchmarks.
The two Lightning studies trade at considerably lower levels and have generated a more modest auction record. Small Study of Lightning has sold five times, achieving prices between £1,500 and £6,600, while Study of Lightning (Medium) occupies the middle ground between the studies and the larger associated works. Together, these four prints demonstrate that collector demand extends beyond the formal suite, creating a broader market for works connected to The Weather Series.
| Artwork | Auction House | Date | Price Realised (with fees) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rain | Heffel | June 2022 | £107,133 |
| Rain | Christie's | September 2023 | £107,000 |
| Snow | Christie's | March 2025 | £81,900 |
| Snow | Phillips | September 2025 | £70,950 |
| Rain | Sotheby's | October 2023 | £82,550 |
David Hockney The Weather Series Prices in 2025 and 2026
The market for The Weather Series has evolved considerably since 2020. What was once a relatively niche segment of the Hockney print market, characterised by infrequent trading and modest price levels, has developed into a more established collecting category with a decade of auction history and increasingly defined valuation benchmarks.
The six prints now occupy distinct positions within the series hierarchy. Snow has emerged as the most consistently traded work, supported by the deepest auction history and the strongest record of price appreciation. Rain remains the rarest and highest-valued print, while Lightning continues to establish its position following a period of rapid repricing. Together, the results demonstrate that market performance varies significantly between individual works, despite their shared place within the same series.
The complete set occupies a category of its own. With only two documented public auction appearances since 2012, opportunities for direct comparison remain exceptionally limited. The 2023 Sotheby’s result provided an important benchmark, but more broadly reinforced a pattern seen across the series as a whole: availability remains the primary constraint on market activity. When examples do emerge, collectors have consistently demonstrated a willingness to compete for them.
MyArtBroker specialises in the private placement and auction advisory of prints and editions. To discuss instant valuation, consignment, or acquisition for works from The Weather Series, browse David Hockney works on the Trading Floor and get in touch with our specialists.
Methodology
All prices referenced in this report are hammer prices in GBP unless otherwise stated. Where prices are described as “with fees”, buyer’s premium has been applied. All charts use hammer prices. This report draws on data from MyArtBroker’s proprietary print market database, which tracks auction results from over 400 auction houses worldwide.
Analysis covers publicly recorded sales of the six core Weather Series prints and the complete set from 2017 through mid-2026. Associated works (Dark Mist, Snow Without Colour, and the Lightning studies) are referenced separately where noted and are not included in aggregate figures. This report is intended as a research tool, providing datadriven insights to support informed decision-making around buying and selling in the art market. Please note that while every effort has been made to ensure accuracy, there may be errors. This report does not constitute financial advice, and MyArtBroker is not liable for any investment decisions made based on its contents.
