"Hugo transcends conventional notions of realism not so much because of her technical ability, but because her drawings of people somehow capture the essence of each particular subject."
- Peter Machen
Hugo is well known for her highly finished, detailed, drawings of South African and migrant workers in pastel, but also utilises other mediums, including oils, textiles and relief printing to convey her expressions of people as well as plants, animals and abstract textures. She investigates our universal human condition by means of a delicate empathy, which is key to her work and is interested in our own and our environment’s transient and fragile nature.