MICHAEL McHUGH HYBRIDOLOGY
13 October - 5 November 2022 MAR TIN BROWNE CO N TEMPORA RY 15 HAMPDEN STREE T PADDINGTON NSW 2021 T EL: 02 9331 7997 FAX: 02 9331 7050 inf o@mar tinbrownecontemporar y. c om www.mar tinbrownecontemporar y. co m GALLER Y HOURS: TUESD AY - SATURD AY 10:30AM - 6PM
LIST OF WORKS
© Martin Browne Contemporary
© All images copyright Michael McHugh
This catalogue is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review as permitted the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process written permission.
COMPILER: James Edwards
PHOTOGRAPHER: Jenni Carter
COLOUR SEPARATIONS: Spitting Image, Sydney
Cover Image: Fandango, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm (detail)
1. Ulysses, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100 cm
2. After Midnight, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 240 cm
3. Seafaring, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 150 x 150 cm
4. Sanctuary, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 120 cm
5. Parade, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 140 x 180 cm
6. Caeruleum Hortus, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100 cm
7. Confetti, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 120 cm
8. Oasis, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 150 x 120 cm
9. Flourish, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 150 x 120 cm
10. Violaceous, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm
11. Fandango, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm
12. Fiesta, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm
13. Cascade, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm
14. Hortus Marinus, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 150 x 150 cm
15. Biosphere, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 120 cm
private
under
without
HYBRIDOLOGY
Over the past year, my research for this show took me in many different directions and locations. My idea was a simple one. With hotter temperatures, rising sea levels and plant forms disappearing into the sea due to salt intrusion, what would this new plant form DNA look like once mixed with marine life?
While walking along Clovelly Beach during low tide, I photographed seaweed dumped on the beach and rocks from the storm the night before. These natural forms were quite strange: some were long and stringy, while others were torn and appeared desperate to hang onto the rock or sandy surface they had been washed up on. Although ripped from their underwater environment, they still looked quite beautiful and serene, just lying in the sand waiting for the tide to rise and to be taken back out into their watery world. All of this was perfect material for drawings and ultimately, paintings.
Visiting a vintage bookshop, I discovered a 1950s American scientific journal, Cryptogamic Botany Vol. II. Bryophytes and Pteridophytes by botanist and phycologist Gilbert M. Smith from Stanford University. This led me to read about the cellular nature of plant forms. In truth, the scholarly language at times was over my head, but the scientific sketches of microscopic studies were fascinating. I photocopied these detailed sections of plant forms and pasted them on my studio walls. What intrigued me was how through my constant drawing, the cellular structure of plants and their shapes morphed into other new, peculiar forms.
As detailed as these new shapes became, it wasn’t until I visited the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx and the LuEsther T. Mertz Library, one of the largest botanical research libraries in the world, that I could really see the scope for this imagined world of plant and sea life forms. The Library is the very same one that Thomas Jefferson worked from – he was apparently obsessed with books, archaeology and architecture. Its collection focuses mainly on botany and I was drawn to the scientific cellular structures it contained. The botanical gardens were beautiful, well-kept and manicured, but it was the library, with its many books from around the globe showcasing different worlds of botany and botanical forms, that was so inspiring.
I couldn’t wait to get back into my studio, where I filled notebooks with drawings and colour studies, and eventually got to work painting. The backgrounds of the canvases changed in this collection of work as they became almost water drenched and layered with weed and underwater colours, while others screamed of saturated sunlight skies with new plant forms floating or falling through the atmosphere. Gradually, a version of my drawings of the cellular structures I had seen in the scientific journals and the Mertz Library in New York became incorporated into the painted works.
Does this collection of new hybrids actually exist? Absolutely not. These works come from my imagination, as does the name of the collection, . Nothing is real, but everything could be. And perhaps it is for a moment – as the viewers’ eye travels around the canvas and they lose themselves in the world of Hybridology, where colour, form and detail come together, allowing them to experience a moment of joy.
-Michael McHugh, October 2022
Ulysses, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100 cm
After Midnight, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 240 cm
Seafaring, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 150 x 150 cm Sanctuary, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 120 cm
Parade, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 140 x 180 cm
Confetti, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 120 cm
Caeruleum Hortus, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100 cm
Flourish, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 150 x 120 cm
Oasis, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 150 x 120 cm
Violaceous, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm
Fandango, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm
Fiesta
, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm Cascade, 2022, acrylic on canvas, 180 x 150 cm
Biosphere on
Hortus Marinus, on
, 2022, acrylic
canvas, 120 x 120 cm
2022, acrylic
canvas, 150 x 150 cm
MICHAEL MCHUGH
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2022 Hyrbidology Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2021 Supernatural, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2021 Pacific Street, Foenander Galleries, Auckland
2020 Exotics, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2019 Hot House, Project 90 Gallery, Sydney
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2022 Sydney Contemporary, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2022 Winter Garden, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2022 Above the Canopy Boroondara Town Hall Art Gallery, Melbourne
2022 Caught in the Briars, Foenander Galleries, Auckland
2022 Melbourne Art Fair, Martin Browne Contemporary, Melbourne
2021 Summer Group Show, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2021 Summer Exhibition, Foenander Galleries, Auckland
2021 Winter Group Show, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2021 Sydney Contemporary, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney (Online)
2020 Summer Exhibition, Foenander Galleries, Auckland
2020 Summer Group Show, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2020 Sydney Contemporary, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney (Online)
2020 Semicolon, Foenander Galleries, Auckland
2020 Winter Group Show, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2020 Flora & Fauna Foenander Galleries, Auckland
2019 Summer Group Show, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney
2019 Pop Up Group Exhibition Project 90, Sydney
2019 Summer Group Exhibition, Project 90, Sydney
AWARDS
2020 Finalist Paddington Art Prize, Defiance Gallery, Sydney
EDUCATION
2018 Masterclass in Painting Certificate, National Art School, Sydney
1999 Professional Publishing and Media, Stanford University, California
1987 Whitecliffe College of Arts & Design Diploma, Auckland
COLLECTIONS
Private collections – USA, UK, Europe, Australia and New Zealand
Private commissions – USA, UK, Europe, Australia and New Zealand
PUBLICATIONS
2021 MiNDFOOD, Supernatural Kaleidoscope, pp. 24- 27, Australia
2021 Artist Profile, Michael McHugh The Kaleidoscope, pp. 58-63, Australia
2020 MiNDFOOD, World of Exotics, pp. 20-21, Australia
