Paul Hughes: I am here & I am unwaiting

Paul was born and raised in Dublin. He works out of his studio, an old pig barn in Blackrock. It gives him the space and opportunity he craves to develop a continuous flow of new abstract landscapes. Paul has been painting for over 35 years. Over this time he has built up a very loyal following. It is only in the last 16 years though that he has publicly exhibited his work.

I am a painter who is driven to obsession in everything I do. I am relentless in my pursuit of 'what is next' and have a stubborn unwillingness to settle or compromise in any piece I work on. 

I am driven by the light and the darkness that surrounds us day in and day out, with a particular focus on the multiplicity of points where light meets light. I love the interaction of land, sea, and sky and the ever-changing and ever-swapping of light between them. The constant absorption and transfer that is utterly continuous. 

All that separates these three things is the compaction of the molecules in their makeup. The solidity of land, the looseness of the sea, the chaos of the sky, and the movement of light between these three forms. Each is uniquely depending on the others and as a painter, I am merely an observer who in turn seeks to absorb this light in all its infinite shades. 

I paint with huge physicality, passion, and emotion. My paintings are of my heart and not my head. I constantly move between forms of realism and abstract expressionism. 

I paint what interests me, I paint what interests me to stare at. My desire is for people who stare at my work to let themselves get lost within it and to travel on their own journeys, through their own thoughts, feelings, and memories. I want to paint 'stimulus', I paint to gain reactions, and interactions. I paint to challenge myself and to overcome my own presumptions and assumptions as a flawed and imperfect human being that I carry and hold every day. I don't paint background music. 

I work in various materials, mainly acrylics, oils, and raw pigments and I am always looking to constantly develop and learn. I have so much to learn and in my own head I will never be good enough so that just drives me on every day. I am hugely influenced by the dark light of South West Kerry, where I have a studio in Kenmare, and also by the wonder that is Dublin Bay. 

Every new day in the studio is a battle, a joyous, glorious battle of discovery and wonderment in color.