When you think of the Young British Artists, your mind might bring up the in-yer-face tactics of Jake and Dinos Chapman, the blasé approach of Damien Hirst, or the fried eggs of Sarah Lucas. As a generation of artists, the YBAs courted controversy at every turn, even appearing on the front pages of tabloids being accused of glorifying child murderers (such as with Marcus Harvey’s Myra, 1995) and for “doing nothing” and then calling it art (like with Tracey Emin’s My Bed, 1998). It could be said the YBAs are equally as remembered for their cause célèbre as for the brilliant art they produced. 

But where does Gary Hume fit into this assessment? At the Freeze art show in 1988, where Mat Collishaw was blowing up a photograph of a bloody head wound to display at large scale, Hume was in the same room displaying one of his early door paintings. The contrast must have been stark. Hume’s door paintings resembled almost blank canvases, their muted colours, olive greens and magnolias, were a result of his predilection for using simple Dulux house paints, of which olive greens and magnolias were in vast supply. Hume’s work at the show resembled, in plain terms, untouched, blank canvases. “At that time,” Hume tells us at his studio in Clerkenwell, “my actions were provocative within the group. They’d be like, ‘what the fuck are you doing?’ And I’d be like, ‘I’ve just done a flower.’”

Hume became known as the YBAs’ quiet man. His serene canvases exuded mindfulness decades before the term came into common parlance. In Hume’s studio today, hundreds of tins of Dulux sit on paint-splattered rack shelving. It’s still his medium of choice. Hanging on the walls are several new works, all of which he is readying to be included in Mirrors and other creatures, a solo exhibition being staged at London’s Sprüth Magers. If paintings of flowers upset his fellow artists way back when, they’ll be devastated by Hume’s new show. Nature is on full display on these canvases and many of them are populated by abstract depictions of swans. 

It all came to him in a dream, apparently. During a listless period where his canvases just weren’t coming together, Hume went to bed and woke up with a start. “I had a dream and this phrase came to me – ‘if in doubt, put a swan on it.’” He went to the studio that morning, painted a swan, and felt he had gotten it out of his system. But the swans kept coming. “After about six months of doing these [swans], I wondered what the hell I was doing. It was probably the first time I’d made something without having the intention of making it. Then I had to decide, do I reject these works because they didn’t have any intention or do I accept them as a gift?” He took the gift.

Many of these new works are a mix of charcoal on canvas (two materials that “just adore each other,” according to Hume) and satinwood paint on aluminium. Using intricate taping and a process of painting and re-painting different areas so the layers of paint build up, Hume is able to give a subtle depth to these works on aluminium that can only be noticed in person. “They love light,” he says of these paintings. “I don’t paint light, I rely upon the sun. I need to create things that enjoy having light on them.”

We met with Hume at a particularly busy time in his career. Aside from the Sprüth Magers show, he also has two retrospective shows opening in London this season. One dedicated to his print work since 1994 at Lyndsey Ingram and another focusing on his paintings from the 90s at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert. He’s also managed to find some time to work with Burberry’s Creative Director Daniel Lee on the house’s SS25 show shown yesterday at the National Theatre during London Fashion Week. 

“[Daniel] saw these tarpaulins I did for the East Country Yard Show, which was curated by Sarah Lucas and Henry Bond. They’re absolutely fucking ginormous but I’ve still got them. He came over, we talked about the tarpaulins and got them out.” The East Country Yard Show was a landmark moment in 90s British art, taking place in an abandoned warehouse in Surrey Docks in 1990. For the Burberry show, Hume’s great tarpaulin work, which was called Bays, was central to the set design. The resurrection of this major but rarely exhibited work from the East Country Yard Show is an incredibly exciting chance to see a genuine piece of British art history on display. 

Working with Daniel Lee and his team has made for an incredibly successful collaboration, according to Hume. But stepping inside the machine of a major fashion house really made him aware of the very different creative processes of an artist and a designer. “I’ve always really admired fashion designers because I cannot comprehend how they can work. I work for two years and then I have an exhibition. Whereas when I first met Daniel, he was just finishing off the pre-season collection. I was like, what? You’ve got to finish your pre-season!? I find it just extraordinary.”

Gary Hume: Mirrors and other creatures runs at Sprüth Magers until October 19th