McCloud's painting explores labor, geopolitics and climate crisis, in both form and content

Brooklyn-based painter Hugo McCloud (born 1980) makes large-scale works depicting resilient laborers and immigrants, as well as colorful abstractions. His figurative paintings often feature subjects from behind, or with their faces otherwise obscured from the viewer. Finding beauty in the everyday is central to McCloud's vision: he regularly incorporates unconventional and overlooked industrial materials such as single-use plastic bags, black tar and sheets of aluminum, along with bronze panels treated with acid. McCloud's ingenious approach to materiality is informed by a deep interest in social and political concerns, as evidenced by the keen focus on immigrant workers in his paintings. Over the past 15 years, McCloud's art has evolved through a rigorous process of inventive experimentation, yielding a remarkable and unique oeuvre that is brought together for the first time in this stunning new survey.