Lot 401 - Gherdai Hassell - Monologue To The Dialogue

ARTIST INFO

About 

Gherdai Hassell is a Bermudian born, China trained, multidisciplinary contemporary artist, writer and storyteller, based in Manchester, UK. Her work investigates memory and nostalgia to create unexpected narratives surrounding identity. She uses collage to thread and weave histories, and tales of transformation passed down through family lineages. Her work typically centers female bodies, simultaneously existing within realms of past, present, and future. Diasporic pasts become re-informed by Black futures, where the resulting present is experienced as a living “Artifacts”, or as her ongoing “alibii” figuration, which are both acts toward afrofuturism. Her work is an exploration of identity as an exploration of materials, and social practice. The work suggests that identity should be self-determined and understood, and contextualized through connection with others. Her multimedia work reimagines relationships with the body as avatar, social space and the invisible world. 

Education 

Master in Contemporary Art - China Academy of Art 

Select Exhibitions/Awards 

AWARDS 
2022 Masterworks Museum Charman Prize  
2022 Manchester Castlefield Gallery Professional Development Award  
2021 Women United Art Prize  
2021 Bermuda Arts Council Education Grant  
2021 Best of Bermuda Award - Visual Artist  
2020 Bermuda Arts Council Exhibition Grant  
2020 Catapult Caribbean Artist Showcase Grant  
 
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS 
2021 Paper People: Women United Art Virtual Exhibition  
2021 Tracing Our Roots : Bermuda National Museum 
2021 I AM Because You Are: Bermuda National Gallery  
2020 Collecting the Gaze: Black Pony Gallery 

Statement about AOAP Submitted Artwork   

I explore mixed media collage as a means to construct and deconstruct identity. Moving and curating materials through concepts of representation, perception, identity creation, and globalization. The thread of influence that runs through this work is the impact of histories, tales of transformation passed down through family lineages. We are all interconnected. The figure plays a central role in many of my collages. My “alibii” hybrid female forms are stylized figures, exploring identity through rest, being, and fashion. I use the layers on the eyes as a lens through which postcolonial diasporic futures might be envisaged and imagined. I create paintings and use them as source material for my figures. Using past images, I collect photographs, sourced from the internet and print media, In my work there are reflections of home, family and the potentiality of a space to present layers of collective experience and meaning.