The deeply atmospheric oil paintings of Szelit Cheung are painstaking studies of light falling in space. Intimate in scale and tightly framed, Cheung’s canvases depict unadorned architectural interiors illuminated by beams of sunlight. Using restricted palettes dominated by a single colour, Cheung works through intricate tonal gradations and theatrical contrasts to lend powerful impressions of space and volume to rarefied interiors. Drawing on the Zen Buddhist concept of Śūnyatā – the void as the origin of all things – Cheung imbues his careful evocations of light-fall with a profound contemplative aspect.

Cheung typically works from maquettes, studying the effects of torchlight to replicate on canvas. With Block 2024, his paintings are for the first time housed in a full-sized version of the maquette from which they were made. The structure resembles a small chapel, shrine or grotto, its sides adorned with rib-like vents, in which tiny paintings are installed in a play of scale and perspective. At one end is an opening admitting controlled light that matches the light depicted in a centrepiece painting, mounted on the inside rear wall. As an evolution of Cheung’s presentational framework, this installation represents a shift in process – from imaging spaces to realising them.