Ronnie Hughes — Zygotic Tendencies
These recent abstractions range from freehand swirls that twist and turn to bright, sherbet-coloured layers of hard-edged stripes and undulations. Two small works on paper open the show with doodles of precise black lines, like elongated tadpoles. Apart from these, no two compositions are really alike: a pale yellow grid pins down coral-red swirls on a pale minty green background in Lattice; yellow triangles crystallise into geometric peaks in Geolu; multicoloured lines form an uncooked spaghetti junction in Broken Meter; while pale ghostly forms shift across Hiddendark. Bridget Riley meets Damien Hirst or Yayoi Kusama in a painting called Moire, above, as multicoloured spots sit on a bed of undulating white strands over a grid of black and green. Here and elsewhere Hughes anchors his work in scientific theory, with reference to aspects of physics, biology, chaos theory and the science of sequence and pattern. The overall result is a somewhat psychedelic reminder of the enduring power of colour and form to lift the spirits and open the mind.
Cristin Leach