GARY HUME
Destroyed School Paintings
This catalogue for an exhibition at Matthew Marks Gallery and Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens features eighteen paintings and six sculptures, all published here for the first time. The paintings were inspired by news photographs of schoolrooms destroyed in recent conflicts in the Middle East. Their distressing poignancy compelled Hume to bring these found images out of the news cycle and into the realm of more lasting contemplation through painting, initiating a deeper, more empathetic experience of the ravages of war. “The Destroyed School paintings seem to force a consideration of a more direct form of advocacy, particularly for anyone mirrored in their surfaces,” writes Suzanne Hudson. “The perversely ebullient colors are helpful; like Trojan horses they bring attention to themselves and hold it there long enough for the horror to register.”
Co-published with Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens and Sprüth Magers