ROBERT MCAULAY : Down in the Tall Grass

Robert McAulay's latest paintings leave the city and head into the countryside, and I love the freshness of these twelve works. Reedbeds, fields, tall grass and the flat earth are tackled with a joy, and the eye of an artist in full flow.

The largest of McAulay’s paintings, ‘Down in the Tall Grass i,’ has a boldness of composition which welcomes you through the grass, beyond the clump, and into the colours beyond. So much is lost in a photo. In his ‘Flat Earth series’ there are textures, either scratched into the painting or sitting out like coloured buttons, which give the work a vitality and physicality. They are the best of abstraction: imaginative yet tangible, while also capturing a moment of beauty.