Sprüth Magers is pleased to present Mirrors and other creatures, a solo exhibition of new work by Gary Hume at the London gallery. Encompassing painting, drawing and sculpture, the show presents Hume’s distinctive approach to the natural world.

The works in this show depict swans, flowers and other natural events. In Hume’s own words: ‘Looking at nature is a direct way of having the sensation that we are not base animals.’ It is through his work that we are presented with the overwhelming sensation of what art can do and of its ability to contain and remind you of the ineffable.

By drawing attention to the temporal and therefore mortal aspects of nature, Hume’s work is suffused with tragedy. The deep and indefinable moments within nature that he portrays will always bear a trace of the recognition of their end, a reminder that death is unavoidable. The forms that he lays down on canvas and aluminium panels and carves from stone reflect these moments.

In the exhibition, the elongated, tangling necks of Hume’s swans are reduced to their essential form—self-restraint is exercised in the bold shapes that glide between figuration and abstraction. Just as his clusters of flowers, on the cusp of death, are condensed into fine lines and folds of petal and foliage, the tactility of warm stone coaxed into a natural silhouette reveals its own internal intricacies.

His simple, open-ended forms are not always easy to decipher, and it is in their ambiguity and the sensitivity of their narrative that they give space to be thought about. Indeed, one can describe Hume’s paintings as works of brevity—by being concise, they are generous.

Hume has described his process as ‘looking while making’, a continual state of exploration and reflection. His tender, muted paintings reveal a sensitivity to the natural world and an acceptance of one’s own futility in the face of its overarching primacy.

The exhibition runs concurrently with two additional shows of Hume’s work — This way / that way, Gary Hume: paintings from the 90s at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert and Untitled at Lyndsey Ingram. The three galleries are within a five-minute walking radius.

Gary Hume (*1962, Tenterden, England) lives in London. Selected solo exhibitions include Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens (2020), Aspen Art Museum (2016), Tate Britain (2013), Pinchuk Art Centre, Kyiv (2012), Modern Art Oxford (2008), Kestnergesellschaft, Hanover (2004), Kunsthaus Bregenz (2004), Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2003), Fundação La Caixa, Barcelona (2000), ICA, London (1999) and The National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh (1999). Selected group exhibitions include National Portrait Gallery, London (2018), Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery (2017), Astrup Fearnley Museet, Oslo (2016), Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg (2014), Museum of Modern Art, New York (2006), Tate Britain, London (2004), Louisiana Museum (2004), Kunsthalle Basel (2002) and Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2001). Hume represented Great Britain at the Venice Biennale (1999) and at the São Paulo Biennial (1996).