Artist Statement
Rooted in drawing and focused on mark-making and minimalist aesthetics, I seek to create harmony and balance in my compositions. I use limited marks in each piece with limited to no colour to intensify and fully appreciate the subtleties of form and line.
Having realised a passion for minimalism and mark-making during academic study, my practice has become refined in appearance, but much broader in its exploration. I describe my practice as drawing based as it nearly always begins as marks on paper, however the final product can be varied in media.
After completing my degree, I spent time in Japan where I absorbed a culture filled with minimal aesthetics and a written language that puts mark making at its’ forefront. It was here I discovered how I could make marks with light through long exposure photography and was able to exhibit this body of work in a group show in Tokyo in 2015.
When I moved to South West Wales, I joined Elysium Studios. Here I had the space and support to examine drawing as an immersive experience. I made my first 3D drawing installation in Elysium's’ testbed space in 2017, which laid the groundwork for a reiteration of this piece for a solo show in March 2019. These installations are 3D drawings, which encourage the viewer to move around the space, discovering a new drawing from each new viewpoint.
Beginning with mark marking, my drawing-based practice shifts from one state to another, with notable transitions into sculpture and installation. The work favours high contrast black and white applications with significant attention paid to balance, rhythm and space. In more recent collaborative endeavours, sound and movement are transcribed, or interpreted via drawing, with the role of ‘the line’ slowly being untangled.
It is often within the transition between states that I am most inspired. Different disciplines will ‘speak to' and interpret one other in different ways, and I find this encourages me to further understand the drawing works as a language in itself.
Theory and research in movement notation, graphic scores, improvisation and chance operations are all influential. The work is pushing for a more immersive and dynamic experience of drawing, and often reflects back the persistent order of nature.
2022
West Cork Arts Centre Artist in Residence
(Aug)
Co Cork (IRL)
Fragments in Constellation,
International group show,
(July)
Co Cork, IRL
2021
Swansea Open (Open call)
Glynn Vivian Gallery
(Dec)
Swansea UK
Oriel Lockdown (Open call)
Aberystwyth Arts Centre,
(Aug)
Aberystwyth UK
2019
RIP - WIP
16 College Str.
(Nov)
Swansea UK
Of Line & Structure (Part II)
Gallery 3
(Apr-May)
Elysium Gallery, Swansea UK
Of Line & Structure
Solo Show
(March)
Elysium Gallery, Swansea UK
Exhibition interview here
Elysium Gallery Artist in Residence
(Jan-March)
Swansea UK
2018
Some Things We Forgot to Remember - Now The Hero
(Sept -Oct)
Swansea Museum, Swansea UK
Glynn Vivian Gallery Artist in Residence
(Feb-April)
Swansea UK
2017
Swansea Open
(Dec)
Black, triangle, line series selected
Glynn Vivian Gallery, Swansea UK
Elysium 10th Birthday Open Studios
(Oct 28th)
Elysium Studios, Swansea UK
Tokyo Digital Artists 2nd Annual Exhibition
(June)
Design Festa Gallery Harajuku, Tokyo JP
Exhibition Catalogue
Wrexham Open
(April)
Line Drawing series selected
Undegun, Wrexham UK
2016
theBloc VIP Show
(June-July)
217 High Street, Swansea UK
Exhibition Catalogue
Exhibition review
theBloc Drawing Show
(May)
217 High Street Swansea UK
Bio
Hazel Cardew graduated with a BA in Fine Arts from the University of Gloucestershire in 2012 and has since participated in group shows in the UK and internationally. She has been Artist in Residence at the Glynn Vivian Gallery and had her first solo show with Elysium Gallery Swansea in 2019. She will be embarking on her first internationally residency with the support of Arts Council Wales in 2022 with the Uillinn:West Cork Arts Centre.
Qualifications: Arts Foundation Degree Stourbridge College 2009,BA Fine Arts (1st Class Hons) University of Gloucestershire 2012.
Awards: Greenwich Decorative Fine Arts Society (GDFAS) Travel Award Grant 2011 (Prague)