Equilibrium Deco

Hudson’s Equilibrium series started off as large and medium format monochromatic paintings — studies in the finite arrangement of vertical and horizontal bars in an 11 by 11 section grid. Their reductive and reflective properties lead him to push the series further by bringing about his questioning of their entrapment within the context of abstract geometric minimalist paintings.

The paintings’ origins as a mapped-out design on a computer program lead to their eventual evolution into what was to present itself next — the Equilibrium (Deco) series. Witnessing the paintings displayed in a grid format on his studio wall and knowing their eventual fate of hanging separately on the walls of their eventual owners sparked an interest to gain more knowledge into the boldness and repetitive nature of Rococo-style wallpaper patterns. Hudson found himself surrounded by these patterns due to the resurgence in their popularity in print material, fabric and textile design and digital media. Here was a seemingly boisterous and decorative pattern which, when reduced to the origins of its creations, were very similar to the gridded designs he was painting. Furthermore, Hudson noticed a cross-section of an 18th century design whose influences stretched back through history and culture with the more modern concept of minimalist art. Overlapping the two on his computer screen was the start of a 12-piece series of mono and polychromatic work.

As Hudson is known for doing he took this series even further by removing the signature red grid altogether, creating a dizzying array of overlapping patterns and saturating their color. This four set series he collectively named The Equinoxes. These large format prints are a study in color, composition and tone — each named after one of the four seasons of the year. Following his reductive nature he weighed the bottom section of each piece with a solid bar of a single color screen of ink in cyan, magenta, yellow and black (or CMYK) the four-color print process used commercially in print today to produce the more than 16.9 million colors we see in magazines, postcards, packaging, billboards, and newspapers.