Free spirited Moruya Craft-artist Hazel Hoffman is featured for the month of July into August at The Gallery in Mogo.
Hazel creates her fascinating variety of craftwork using texture, colour, fibre, hand-made paper and paint, she is also accomplished at painting and printmaking.
Originally from the UK, Hazel arrived in Sydney in her teens. She loved art from a young age but work and the responsibilities of raising a family restricted her opportunity to continue with her passion. Following retirement Hazel became involved with Art Central and the Eurobodalla Fibre and Textile Art Group (EFTAG). She says her work with textiles “kicked the whole thing off from there and I embraced the creative process”.
The Gallery is showcasing her imagination ‘running hot’ with assemblage sculpture, spun fleece, felted fabrics, woven baskets, fun brooches, and jewellery made from found objects. One of her most beautiful works on display is an elegant, two toned grey, felted shawl, and another is a spring scarf made from a cleverly looped skein of multi coloured, spun wool.
Not that her carefully planned projects progress as smoothly as expected. She says, “I often find I take off in an unprecedented direction and the end result is usually a surprise, which I call going with the flow”.
This year Hazel has been working with found objects. She says, “I don’t like anything going to waste so I have been using up my stash of materials to weave large, multi coloured laundry baskets”.
Formed into circular, cone like shapes, these baskets have proved very popular at The Gallery.
Another example of recycling is her use of five python skins shed and collected on Hazel’s farm.
She says, “I love the translucent, elastic quality of the python skin and how stretching it over a shape will exploit and enhance its diamond patterns”.
In an extraordinary bust of a woman the skins have been stretched and glued over a head built from papier-mache and coloured tissue paper on a wire armature. It is finished with a hairline defined by plaited silk scarves, a flourish of emu feathers and a crown of second hand brass and coloured buttons sourced from the ESC Buy Back Centre or donated by friends.
Also on the walls are Hazel’s collage of an old church made with her own hand-made paper, a watercolour of an old farm truck and a concertina shaped, coloured woodcut print.
Creative Arts Batemans Bay Incorporated (CABBI) is a society open to local arts and crafts practitioners and operates The Gallery as a co-operative venture. People interested in finding out more about CABBI should drop in to The Gallery, Mogo or phone 02 4474 2243.
