UK
Batchelor of Fine Arts (Hons) U.W.E (Bristol)
Trained Photographer in Film & Digital Photography Studios (UK) 1996 - 2005
Bev Hayes Photographic Studio  2005 - 2012
Member of Hot Bed Press, Salford, UK, 2021

Sweden
Printmaking Studio Practice since 2017
Member Ålgården Konstnärernas Verkstäder & Galleri, Borås 2020
Member Konstnärernas Kollektiv Verkstad KKV BGB  2020
Ansvarig för Koppargrafik ​ ( Delat ) Jan 2022
Print workshop manager KKV GBG Since Jan 2022
 

Creative Biography   

British born Visual Artist now based in Sweden and working in the media of Visual Arts, Digital Photography and Analogue Printmaking from a self developed print studio. After graduating with a Batchelor of Fine Arts from the UK, (BFA Hons in Studio Arts and Printmaking) Bev went on working in the arts sectors, taking on teaching roles, gallery manager then running her own photographic portrait studio before moving with her family to Sweden in 2012.

 

In 2020, she became an active member of the Grafiken Verkstad at Konstnärernas Kollektivverkstan in Göteborg and Ålgården Grafik Verkstad, Borås, two fully equipped, established Print Studios on the West Coast of Sweden. For the over two years now she has gone on to make collections of Photopolymer Gravures and form collaborations with Gothenburg based and International Artists for exhibitions and film projects, selling work at art fairs locally and Internationally. 

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Studio Practice 

Printmaking and Photography joins together with experimentation in moving images from video to short film making. Within these media lies a curiosity about to all forms of mark making and how they translate as a tactile presence. Background studies in drawing and painting weave into her creative print process, to be retold in a 2D and recently in a 3D aspect. Amalgamating the digital process into an analogue printmaking is an on going exploration of taking techniques further within each series. Bev has a keen interest in keep traditional print methods alive, but also using low toxic printing methods as a chosen path for health and environmental reasons.

 

Some photo works are made from discarded prints that over time allow for new layers of possibilities to come through. The themes can run parallel with one another. The aim is to creative fluid media that has no singular genre or trope can be pinned to it but allows for new cross overs and another expression. Thus they go on re morphing and repeating in pattern form with a common thread rooted in nature. Finding new ways of reusing and re working as a form of resourcefulness, and as an offset helps minimise waste in the long term. 

    

Alongside this organic body of work, there is as backbone of research and field notes for her creations to be contextualised and more fully realised. Reading around our relationship with the natural world about how we respond and manage our place and wellness within the changing environment, comes into play during these walks and immersions in nature. Finding a way to protect what is around us and living so nature can thrive on, is a larger collective concern we all share. 

 

Bev plays visually in camera with scenes of the sensory kind in micro and marco manner.  From treading carefully through forests, climbing coastal rocky crags to retracing routes in localities, they highlight the landmarks of our existence. Sounds and signals we once were intune with often are unnoticed and ignored. Therein lies a question about advancing new technology, all our digital experiences and needs continually met at a press of a button - or intelligence of the artificial kind, can we still connect and learn from nature at a pace in which we can sustain it ?  

For our real-time instincts to remain present within us. 

 

Searching for a deeper interconnectedness. Referencing harmonies in nature and looking out for small deep wonders, the subtle changes in seasonal ebb and flow. This kind of engagement and reciprocity we all can share could be the key to turning around a fateful futures. Can we aim to nurture and move towards a Symbioscene ?

 

One visual representation of this is seen in the collaborative project HYPHAE, which stems back to explorations on the subject of Land Art. 

 

Bev Hayes Jan 2023

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Print Background

BA Hons in FINE ART (Printmaking)

Grounding knowledge in traditional printmaking was forged at Print Departments; University Of the West of England, Bristol, and along side the reputable, Centre for Fine Print Research. and John Moores University, Liverpool.

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Printmaking Tutor at The Bluecoat Arts Centre, Print Room, Liverpool 

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Photopolymer gravure courses at Konstnärernas Kollektivverkstad, Gothenburg 2021

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Ongoing print practice at print studios when travelling to UK.

 

Dedicated time to print now comes full circle, relating back to the titles of works made previously during her degree studies, `Translations I, II, II'   'A Poetry of Place'  and 'Leaving a place you are connected to ´.  

 

"Rekindling my print practice in the light of a new set of circumstances, seasonal impressions and the search for creative identity and synergy in the land I came to be. I record my tale of two cities, in ways that are both disparate yet embracing in its duality."  

 

Emblems of Land Art  :  WEBLAND, UNDERLAND, HYPHAE, BOTANICAL and recent ELEMENTS OF THE LONG SEASON I - I V.  

 

The continuation series 'Elements of the long season VI, has just featured at an exhibition in Athens,

'Self Portrait ' in Etch Ink Art Space  - in collaborations with Athens Printmaking Center 3.3 - 8.4  

Read News for more detail and press release. 

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Interpreted Process

 

´What I set out to capture, with a tool of digital means, is in direct impulse and sensory response to experiences of light and shadow over contrasted forms. Catching these sensory instances in a micro and macro manner and sometimes more expansive scenes deal with the relationship between spacial and solitude of a figurative form, not always human, within that experience. Printmaking is the channel to amalgamate this imagery into being. A slowed down process from digital to analogue, with deconstructions and re constructions along the way. This back and forth moves the work into a desired painterly print realm. 

Often plays with the chance, freedom and the constrained. Capturing these ambiguous narratives along side strong graphic forms are important elements in her work. At times, based in personal experience, other recordings represent existentially with the natural world, our place in it and our instinct to sustain it.  Bev Hayes 2020

 

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Studio Development.

Hayes initiated a project to develop Print Studio, testing and researching safer and less toxic working methods for better health and environment. Working in collaboration with fellow printmakers as a member and workshop manager of Konstnärernas Kollektiv Verkstad  in Gothenburg and more recently connecting as a member of Ålgården Konstnärernas Verkstäder & Galleri, Borås. Sharing and exchanging print techniques.

 

Joining these workspaces has enabled her to get to know the art scene in Gothenburg and Sweden, and further participation in group exhibitions. 

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PHOTOPOLYMER GRAVURE AT KKV GBG

Learn together the basic process of photopolymer gravure and intaglio printing at   www.kkvgbg.se  

Gothenburg Collective Graphic Workshop

 

Contact Bev if you wish to learn printmaking  - I offer one to one tutoring. 

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Bev Hayes

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