Graham Hay
Based in Western Australia, Graham Hay is internationally active.
Artist Graham Hay has participated in 174 exhibitions across sixteen countries, including seven biennales in Australia, Holland, Argentina, Romania, and Venice, Italy. A recipient of 20 grants and awards, his artwork is in public collections in eight countries. Hay has written articles for art publications in nine countries, and he features in 22 books. He is a graduate from the Western Australian, Edith Cowan, and Curtin universities (the latter two majoring in ceramics and sculpture). Admitted to the peak International Academy of Ceramics in 2019, Graham is based in the Farmer Street Studio, in Perth, Western Australia.
A paper clay pioneer, Graham has led paper clay workshops across 14 countries, leading paper clay symposiums or conferences in Hungary, the US and Norway. He frequently writes on paper clay, art and technology, with over 40 articles published.
While Graham is well known for his technical innovations and expertise in both paper clay and compressed paper sculpture, he also works across other materials, new technologies, video and performance. he has collaborated with fellow artists, academics, engineers and scientists, writing journal articles as well as researching together such as hacking 3D printers and incorporating living fungi in outdoor paper sculptures, which are documented on his website.
Themes in his work include the complex relationship between the individual and collective, individual repetition and identity, ritual and social structures, cultural systems and new technology. He has completed three quarters of a PhD on real social and professional network patterns in the arts. Motifs include the use of multiples to create biomorphic shapes: spirals, coils, koru, cornucopia, circles, deconstructing binary or polarised thinking.
Graham's art practice is self reflective. His artwork is a response to the very social foundations of his art practice. It has become a speculation or comment on a wide range of groups and institutions, into which he as a freelance artist and cultural researcher, was invited to exhibit, speak, teach and write. In a more formal sense, his art and writing represents over two decades of critical ethnography research. Ethnography began as a static, statistical study of culture. It was an anthropology, then sociologically based field of research. Hay's critical ethnography approach is political and andragogical, a contemplative studio led research which acknowledges its participatory and subjectivity bias.
Artist Graham Hay has participated in 174 exhibitions across sixteen countries, including seven biennales in Australia, Holland, Argentina, Romania, and Venice, Italy. A recipient of 20 grants and awards, his artwork is in public collections in eight countries. Hay has written articles for art publications in nine countries, and he features in 22 books. He is a graduate from the Western Australian, Edith Cowan, and Curtin universities (the latter two majoring in ceramics and sculpture). Admitted to the peak International Academy of Ceramics in 2019, Graham is based in the Farmer Street Studio, in Perth, Western Australia.
A paper clay pioneer, Graham has led paper clay workshops across 14 countries, leading paper clay symposiums or conferences in Hungary, the US and Norway. He frequently writes on paper clay, art and technology, with over 40 articles published.
While Graham is well known for his technical innovations and expertise in both paper clay and compressed paper sculpture, he also works across other materials, new technologies, video and performance. he has collaborated with fellow artists, academics, engineers and scientists, writing journal articles as well as researching together such as hacking 3D printers and incorporating living fungi in outdoor paper sculptures, which are documented on his website.
Themes in his work include the complex relationship between the individual and collective, individual repetition and identity, ritual and social structures, cultural systems and new technology. He has completed three quarters of a PhD on real social and professional network patterns in the arts. Motifs include the use of multiples to create biomorphic shapes: spirals, coils, koru, cornucopia, circles, deconstructing binary or polarised thinking.
Graham's art practice is self reflective. His artwork is a response to the very social foundations of his art practice. It has become a speculation or comment on a wide range of groups and institutions, into which he as a freelance artist and cultural researcher, was invited to exhibit, speak, teach and write. In a more formal sense, his art and writing represents over two decades of critical ethnography research. Ethnography began as a static, statistical study of culture. It was an anthropology, then sociologically based field of research. Hay's critical ethnography approach is political and andragogical, a contemplative studio led research which acknowledges its participatory and subjectivity bias.
I'm interested in the social foundations of cultural production, so my personal response to the context of my making, or that of my exhibiting work, saturates the work itself." |
Graham graduated from the Universities of Western Australia, Edith Cowan, and Curtin. While he works across different mediums, he is an internationally recognised as a pioneer in the paper clay sculpture movement. Having given over 300 artist talks, workshops, and demonstrations in a dozen countries, he was invited to co-lead the first international paper clay symposia in Hungary, the US and Norway, and to recently join the Académie Internationale de la Céramique.
Paper clay is now a third of all clay used in pottery and sculpture studios and classrooms in Western Australia, offering both an easier entry pathway for clay beginners, and increased creativity potential for experienced potters and sculptors.
Paper clay is now a third of all clay used in pottery and sculpture studios and classrooms in Western Australia, offering both an easier entry pathway for clay beginners, and increased creativity potential for experienced potters and sculptors.
I have been a ‘clay-aholic' since childhood, transferring my enthusiasm to the new material paper clay in 1992. This was after being introduced to it as a way to make tiles that do not warp, by Ceramic Chemist Jaromir (Mike) Kusnik OAM (Czech/Aust) . |
He has also pioneered a dry process for creating up to 4 tonne sculptures in compressed paper, a type of artificial wood, which he exhibits both inside and permanently outside in the weather. In response to questions on the permanency of these structures, he worked with a Mycologist and a fungi and bacteria Artist to infect one of his sculptures with these agents for biodegradation.
Corresponded with an Archaeologist from Ireland he developed creative ideas, and later participated together on a panel during the Dublin Biennale and co-authored a journal article for the Irish national ceramic arts journal. Assisted by an engineer, and after meeting with Italian 3D printing experts, Graham assembled and hacked a 3D printer, so that it printed in paper clay. Currently at Curtin University he is undertaking a ceramic studio practice led PhD research, of local and international artist networks.
Other major projects are documented here.
Generous by nature, he has written over 20 journal articles on paper clay, paper and art, and provides a huge, information packed website www.grahamhay.com.au on art and techniques, and stays grounded through running very small studio-based classes from Robertson Park Artists Studio in Perth, Western Australia.
Artist CV
details
Corresponded with an Archaeologist from Ireland he developed creative ideas, and later participated together on a panel during the Dublin Biennale and co-authored a journal article for the Irish national ceramic arts journal. Assisted by an engineer, and after meeting with Italian 3D printing experts, Graham assembled and hacked a 3D printer, so that it printed in paper clay. Currently at Curtin University he is undertaking a ceramic studio practice led PhD research, of local and international artist networks.
Other major projects are documented here.
Generous by nature, he has written over 20 journal articles on paper clay, paper and art, and provides a huge, information packed website www.grahamhay.com.au on art and techniques, and stays grounded through running very small studio-based classes from Robertson Park Artists Studio in Perth, Western Australia.
Artist CV
details
