Hot Hot Hot presents nine large oil paintings by Nick Mullaly. Titled after The Cure song of the same name, the works in Hot Hot Hot merge melancholic eroticism with uncanny scenes, each one encased in an amber glow. The work engages a kind of gleaning: cursory sketches, notes, and references to cinema have been layered to create mysterious and contemplative images.

Throughout these images, mysterious discrepancies emerge. A golden suit becomes a light source, car headlights penetrate bodies, lava makes a stage for the theatrical wilting of out of scale flowers. Light bends like nothing in real life. But every image feels real.

Mullaly’s work opens space for the unusual and the ‘wrong’ to blend with cinema and its erotic glamour. Castoff background figures take center stage, their languorous sex appeal lit from under/over/within a burning spotlight. These are charged moments, blushing with a tension that is always turning its back; paused sequences from an unmade film. There’s a story here, but you’ll be put to work to find it.