Art Project course gallery No. 7

Art Project: Hair

The starting point for this week’s project was hair. In light of the current lockdown, hair has become a preoccupation / concern for  a number of people who have shared stories, pictures and comments regarding their increasing hair length or ‘lockdown locks’. Others have resorted to drastic home-made haircuts or DIY disasters. Recently, the BBC ran a story about people who confessed to breaking lockdown rules and included a story from a man who discovered “an underground network of hairdressers”, got his haircut and subsequently upset his family for flaunting the social distancing rules.

Hair can play a large part in establishing our identity and a key factor in a number of popular stories, legends, religious and social customs throughout history and across the world. From Samson and Delilah to Rapunzel through to Hasidic Jews’ and Sikhs’ emphasis on concealing and revealing hair as well as the social, political and spiritual statements surrounding dreaded, matted and shaved heads.

Here’s a selection of artwork and prepatory studies made by some of the Art Project course artists taking part in the project.

Look out for another gallery of work coming soon…

Jane Goddard – A Lifetime of Hair
Acrylic on paper

Jill – Seven Ages of My Hair
Photo collage

Jill – Save My Wig! (Apologies to Munch)
Ink on paper

Chris – Four Heads with Hair
Mixed media

Hilary – You Like?
Acrylic on paper

Lorna Howell – ‘Here’s to big grey hair, girls!’ (Zoom book club, May 2020)
Mixed media

Lorna Howell – Nepalese Ladies
Pastel on acrylic paper
Lynn Laws – Now That’s A Wig!
Pastel and graphite on paper
Lynn Laws – The Punk Hair I Always Wanted
Acrylic on paper

Lynn Laws – Shaved Head
Acrylic and graphite on paper


Paula – Flowers In Her Hair (My niece at her outdoor wedding on
the hottest weekend of 2019)
Gouache on paper

JC – Still Life on the Beach
Mixed media

JC – Punk Poets

Ink and gouache on paper

JC – Punk hair after Basquiat
Mixed media
JC – Belle’s New Hair Colour
Ink and pastel on paper
Christie Archer – Daughter Inspired by Lichtenstein
Mixed media: collage, ink and digital formatting
Christie Archer – Woman (Inspired by Dante Rossetti)
Mixed media: watercolour pencil on digital background

Tony Townshend – Untitled
Media unstated

Dieter – Proserpina (Green) (after Dante Gabriel Rosetti)
Acrylic on cardboard
Dieter – Proserpina (Purple) (after Dante Gabriel Rosetti)
Acrylic on paper
Harriet – Locks on Lockdown
Mixed media including handmade paper boxes and hair
Harriet  – A Museum  of Haircuts
Handmade paper boxes, ink and gouache
Maurice – The Creation of Venus, E=mc2
Mixed media
Jo Melhuish – Strange Waterfall
Acrylic on canvas

Vanda – Hair, The Musical
Acrylic on paper

John Cutler – Hair – Let The Sunshine In!
Collage: paper on paper

John Cutler – Tie Red Ribbons In Her Hair
Acrylic on paper