MYTHOS - Russell Gallery - London - 12 - 28th Feb 2026

MYTHOS

Hearn’s deep-rooted fascination with ancient history and its rich tapestry of myths and legends began in his early childhood in Cyprus. The profound impact of exploring the ruins and sites in Kourion and Paphos— encompassing stunning mosaics, thermal baths, and a grand amphitheater, had a profound effect on the young artist's mind.

“The moment I saw the ancient ruins, it seemed like I had traveled back through a gateway in time; it felt to me that I was finally home, like a once-lost and forgotten memory of a past life, haunting and yet so very familiar.”

Mythos is an exhibition that collates all those abstracted childhood memories, binding them with the stories of myths and legends, covering ancient Roman, Greek, Minoan and Sumerian civilisation's. Hearn's palette is taken from the frescoes of that time, featuring red oxides, azurite, lapis lazuli blues, and vibrant yellow shades, which were once made from ochre's and sulphur.

Hearn approaches the theme with ambiguous abstracts such as “Alexandria’s Lighthouse,” with its soft shapes of boats that glide past the eye like fish in an aquarium, illuminated by a single vibrant brushstroke of yellow dawn on the canvas.

Influences of the American 1950's artist Richard Diebenkorn come into play in Hearn’s painting “Arena,” where he notes the similarities between Diebenkorn’s palette and the geometric abstracts of the frescoes at Pompeii.

The geometric paintings in Hearn’s solo exhibition are threaded with mythical characters and animals weaving through the abstracts, enabling a narrative and context. The Minoan King Minos and his great white bull a gift and a curse from Zeus are painted with simple flowing lines, featuring a Minoan character who caresses the bull as a soothsayer or whisperer.

Horses also have a prominent place in this body of work; ancient Greek horses painted using bitumen are arranged like an ancient carousel. Xerxes' campaign against the Spartans and Greece, taking his army and horses across the Aegean Sea, is beautifully depicted using vibrant cadmiums in his painting “Across the Aegean.”

The legendary quest of the Argonauts for the Golden Fleece is transformed into a dreamlike tableau, featuring the mythical ship Argo as it embarks on its perilous mission at the behest of King Pelias. This central scene bursts forth in radiant yellows, creating an ethereal sense of opening, as if the viewer is looking through a portal into another realm.

Mythos invites you on an immersive journey through the veils of antiquity, where each piece serves not just as art but as a bridge connecting the past with the present, rekindling the timeless narratives that continue to resonate in our collective consciousness.

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Blue Talisman VI

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-Still-

Heath Hearn lives and works on the Edgcumbe Country Estate within South East Cornwalls Rame Peninsula.

'Still' is inspired by the painters 2020 diary and sketch book.

Hearn's gentle observations on the more positive sides of the year take you into a timeless world where nature reigns supreme.

Many of Hearn's paintings in this exhibition are hinged on a tension between the figurative and the abstract, not unlike the painter Ivon Hitchens, who Hearn has taken inspiration from for the woodland landscapes for this show, uniquely stylising the shapes and immediacy of Hitchens application.

Other observations in this exhibition include the simpler joys of life. Paintings of hanging washing on a line blowing furiously in the wind, a still life of a posy of primroses, to more childlike narratives such as the dazzling 'Silent Parks and Empty Buses'.

It is not only visual observations that are distilled into this work but also emotional and aural. Vertiginous skyscrapers that hinge on the abstract and the figurative, translate the artists emotional response to the events of the year.

Listening to a radio programme about natures reclamation of man and marine life appearing in places where they have never been seen in recorded history, takes the painter beyond his surroundings to imaginings of whales rejoicing in the absence of industry, which Hearn translates as a metaphor of hope for the future.

'Still takes you on a wondrous journey through an artists musings and observations of a very quiescent year.