London has a way of adopting outsiders. The South African painter Ryan Hewett, now showing at Unit London, is one of those rare figures whose work manages to seduce the city’s collectors while resisting the easy formulas of market demand. His first European exhibition here in 2015 sold out in less than three hours. A decade later, his practice has shifted, fractured, and rebuilt itself into something more restrained yet more profound.

Phases of a Painter’s Evolution

Hewett maps his career in three movements: the tightly wrought pencil drawings of his early years, the explosive gestural portraits that brought him recognition, and now a pared-back, geometric exploration of form and texture. Each shift is not a rupture but a shedding of what no longer serves him.

Every successful element of my work has stayed; I just try and get rid of what doesn’t work.

– As he puts it.

This willingness to burn bridges behind him has kept his practice vital. Like an actor discarding costumes, Hewett changes not to chase trends but to avoid stagnation — because for him, irrelevance is the true enemy.

Between Abstraction and Flesh

At the heart of his current exhibition is the female figure, abstracted through linear cutouts and futurist geometries. Gone are the heavily layered impastos that once distorted and dramatized the human face. In their place, quiet fragments of form invite the viewer to imagine what is absent as much as what is present.

This is not a rejection of figuration but its extension.

Painting is about looking beyond and trying to put your finger on a feeling, as opposed to a faithful reproduction of an image.

– Hewett sees photo-realism as a cul-de-sac.

His canvases reveal a tension between body and void, emotion and architecture, portrait and puzzle.

Mental Warfare and the Artist’s Drive

To hear Hewett describe his process is to glimpse the battlefield of creation. He calls painting a kind of “mental warfare” — a continual negotiation with blocks, frustrations, and the oscillations of doubt and elation. And yet, this struggle is his oxygen. The long hours of staring, revising, stepping back from the canvas are not wasted time but the silent labor of discovery.

There is excitement, too — what philosopher John Dewey once described as the turmoil essential to expression. Hewett thrives on that edge, chasing the thrill of making a work that excites him first, trusting that this excitement will transmit itself to others.

The Soul in Paint

When asked about spirituality in art, Hewett resists lofty claims but admits that painting is “primarily about the soul.” His works invite contemplation not through overt symbolism but through presence: textured surfaces that hold memory, ambiguous forms that open space for awe. Even his portraits of historical figures — both heroes and villains — operated in that gray zone where certainty dissolves, where Hitler might be mistaken for Chaplin.

It is this moral and emotional ambiguity that makes his paintings resonate in an age awash with misinformation. The viewer is asked not for conclusions but for attentiveness.

A Painter Who Refuses to Rush

Hewett remains steadfastly loyal to the physical act of painting. While digital art and virtual worlds tempt others, he prefers brush, canvas, and the tactile rhythms of paint. His advice to younger artists is almost monastic in its simplicity: do not rush.

Time doesn’t move as fast as everyone says. Don’t panic. Keep evolving and making work you believe in.

In the end, Ryan Hewett’s art is not about arriving at a final style but about sustaining a practice of becoming. Each phase, each battle with the canvas, is another attempt to wrestle with the ineffable — and to leave behind a trace of the struggle in paint.

Ryan Hewett’s latest exhibition is on view at Unit London, Hanover Square, until July 13, 2025.