T.J. McNamara: Colour abstraction enchanting to the eye

Colour Code 2010 by Sarah Hughes is a poised, balanced, geometric, classical abstraction. Photo / Supplied

"All art aspires to the quality of music," said W.H. Pater in his Victorian purple prose when writing about the Venetian artist Giorgione. He failed to say whose music and he wrote long before the establishment of abstract art.

Yet his remark remains pertinent because it is difficult to write about abstract art except in terms of music, and two exhibitions make the point very strikingly this week.

At the Gow Langsford Gallery the work of Sara Hughes is poised, balanced, geometric, classical abstraction. One huge work of 190 pieces has the precision and clarity of variations by Johann Sebastian Bach, while the other pieces in the show have the development of a basic theme in the manner of Mozart.

Nevertheless, the colour and inspiration of these lyrical works are firmly contemporary. Behind the work is a careful accumulation of sources as well as an immense amount of contemplative decision-making.

In the large work done on paper - it reads as one work though its 109 parts are available separately - each variation has 10 rectangles of various sizes in individual colours, 1950 in all. These rectangles are carefully arranged in balanced compositions and no two colours are exactly the same across the whole work.

The colours on each sheet are derived from the colour schemes of large trading banks, one for almost every country in the world. Though the shades of the colours differ, the tone is exactly the same and this confers unity across the whole.

The amount of research and colour mixing behind the work as well as its technical precision is staggering. It eclipses the much-admired, large energetic zigzagging composition that Hughes has done in the past but it is still derived from computer data.

The same colours established from studies of the banks' corporate images are used in the accompanying acrylic paintings. Some are bands of colour vibrantly arranged but the two most triumphant ones are where the colour is arranged within a honeycomb pattern.

In each polygon there are one or two areas of plain colour and one prismatic segment of the rest of that set. The result is a feeling of enormous energy but strictly under control. The colours are a rhythmic delight. If you allow your eye to travel around the reds, it is taken on an enchanting dance. You can choose the blues and do the same. Only the shades of black steady the rhythm.

It makes a splendid exhibition and leaves the viewer lost in admiration of how with every major exhibition Hughes darts of in a new direction while remaining true to the quality of her own voice and style.

Almost next door, upstairs at the Antoinette Godkin Gallery, Andre Hemer uses almost exactly the same range of colours as Hughes although they are arrived at intuitively. The title of the show, You Can't Kill Me, I'm Notorious, sets the tone, which is romantically riotous. This abstract art is jazzy, improvised and liberated from any rules. Spontaneity is all. The work has the apparent randomness of the music of John Cage or a very good-natured Harrison Birtwhistle.

There are passages of repetitive patterns and these leap around in looping, unexpected ways. The technique of the paintings is improvisational, too. Often the canvas is left bare. In the background are mists of soft colour done with an airbrush. There are areas that are collage with the paper vigorously chopped about. Overall there is a feeling of great confidence. The playful nature of the work is emphasised by titles such as When Mario had game like Jimmy Choo. These titles can give some sort of way into the work. Something important superseded by the 3D special has a background of soft verticals smashingly contradicted by big loops of repetitive shapes driving in out of nowhere. A Gradient for every season is given piquancy in the midst of its fertile colour strokes of dashing black.

More still and solemn but equally rich in colour is Abundance, the lovely exhibition of cast glass by Ann Robinson at FHE Gallery. In the introduction to the show the artist writes, "I like the idea that my pieces read like a piece of music."

The way Robinson's work has evolved out of craft is exemplified by a superb bowl in rich red which is sculptural but retains its vessel quality. Most of the other works, developed from the seedpods of flax, are truly sculpture while retaining the transparency of glass.

The seedpods yield an elongated, elegant, rising shape. The shape is the same through many variants of size and colour. Some of the smaller pods take on a twist as if they had dried. They all have a metal stalk to counterpoint the glow of the glass and to emphasise the natural forms of their source. Two tangerine twisted pods are particularly fine.

The works are never static. The quiet rhythm of the forms leads to an interplay of light and to changes in colour at different times of the day. There are three magnificent large pods that very subtly blend green, orange and yellow. The show reinforces Robinson's considerable reputation and makes powerful links between the outstanding skills involved in craft and the observation and imagination needed for fine art.

Links between cars and relationships between the sexes is evident everywhere. This truth lies behind the dramatic painting of cars, men, women and service stations by Anah Dunsheath at Sanderson Contemporary Art.

The drama comes from the lighting in the paintings where the spotlit background figures of men and women are posed on the wide forecourt of a service station against a dark background heavy with symbolism.

The darkness is relieved a little by additions of bright stainless steel to the surface of some of the paintings. Formerly Dunsheath has done impressive sculpture in stainless steel but it is an intrusion here and better paintings do not have it. There is one exception: a tall painting called Suspended Animation where the painting unrolls from a tall steel bar at one side and a diver poised in the black sky plunges into the forecourt of cars, texting, skirts and Coke.

In their own way the paintings reveal potent tension in relationships and society as well as their bold visual impact.

At the galleries

What: Colour Codes by Sara Hughes
Where and when: Gow Langsford Gallery, 26 Lorne St, to Nov 27
TJ says: Elaborate processes of research, recording and colour mixing lie behind Hughes' vibrant abstractions and give meaning to their vivid variations.

What: You Can't Kill Me I'm Notorious by Andre Hemer
Where and when: Antoinette Godkin Gallery, to 28 Lorne St, to Dec 4
TJ says: Energetic painting, air-brushing and collage make for bright, looping, spontaneous abstraction full of spirit and joy.

What: Abundance by Ann Robinson
Where and when: FHE Galleries, 2 Kitchener St, to Dec 3
TJ says: Robinson's experience and abilities with cast glass have given her a worldwide reputation and this splendid show exemplifies the way she blurs all boundaries between craft and sculpture.

What: Contxt by Anah Dunsheath
Where and when: Sanderson Contemporary Art, 251 Parnell Rd, to Nov 21
TJ says: Dramatically lit under a night-black sky, these paintings mix cars, service stations, women, men and consumer products in potent tensions.

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