Hazel Elsbach

Practice & background

Raised in western Massachusetts, Hazel Elsbach earned a BFA in Printmaking from RISD in 2018 and lives in New York. Printmaking, drawing and material experimentation form a practice concerned with relationships between external landscapes and inner experience.

Her artist statement describes the transformative potential of discarded remnants and ordinary materials. Dense passages coexist with open areas, making abstract images resemble archaeological maps or aerial landscapes and leaving room for viewers to connect traces.

In Who Art You, she explains a process often mistaken for photography: ink is sprayed in fine layers and handled like light and shadow. Broken objects collected during city walks become starting points, while the final reveal preserves an element she cannot fully predict.

Looking at the work

Fine ink layers, shadows and paper surfaces bring renewed attention to fragments whose original function may be unclear.