Two years ago I wrote an introduction to Nick Moore's catalogue for his last show at Gallery K. Looking at the work for this exhibition I can see that the artist is preoccupied by the same concerns that made his previous show such a rich experience but now there is a broader range of reference and the work exudes a greater confidence and assurance.

He continues to compartmentalise like a concerned scientist in search of order and discovery, pursuing in painting his ideas through colour and form while his crafted linocuts reveal his more immediate observations and reflections.

With many artists this might appear a rather Jekyll and Hyde characteristic but in Moore's case there is no conflict between the two languages. This is because the abstract forms in his paintings have such strong associations and references to the physical world while in his linocuts the physical presence of his diver is rendered through simplified form to convey movement.

The more one looks the closer the similarities, the diver descends and ascends and the light coming through the water is brilliantly resolved into a swirling shape that echoes the large spheres that cluster in paintings such as "opening". The sea urchins which the diver is in search of have their counterparts in the painting "radiolaria" where the stellar shape of the urchin has become a more complex form, like a pulsating star that appears to rotate within its own orbit.

The most recent paintings are reduced in scale but are painted in series and grouped in sequence. Are the forms that float and wriggle alchemical signs or strange embryos contained within their own vessels? The intervals between individual canvasses have particular significance in our reading of the images. The shadows cast enhance the physical presence of each picture, while in a number of cases the image appears to continue across several canvasses , creating a sense of time as we read the work from left to right and from top to bottom.

Moore has built upon the ideas from his last show. There is now a greater feeling of floating and movement but we could be inside the body or suspended in space. The references abound as the artist continues his exploration of a number of worlds.

Nick Tite