LONDON.- For his first solo exhibition with Poppy Sebire, James Aldridge presents a selection of large paintings, watercolours and sculptural work. With influences ranging from natural history to heavy metal, the artist continues to explore themes around knowledge, belief and good and evil. Aldridge’s expansive canvases unite psychedelia with the arcane. In their animalistic imagery, dense compositions and heterogeneous painterly techniques, there is an explosion of the natural order, whilst the decorative runs amok. The new paintings bring three-dimensional elements to an otherwise graphic sensibility: illusionistic bird illustrations overlay intricate patterns of foliage and silhouetted beasts. The atmosphere can appear violent and disorderly, as in the bloodlike streams of red paint which drip from birds’ beaks. Imagery from Christian as well as esoteric and occult symbols draws attention to the function of s