Art Hazelwood
Artist Background
For over thirty-five years Art Hazelwood has created politically charged prints, working with arts organizations, unions and grassroots movements. He has been consistently involved with homeless rights.
In 2024 Art received the Art is a Hammer Award from the Center for the study of political Graphics, the most prestigious award in the nation for political poster artists. He was part of the founding of the San Francisco Poster Syndicate — a vast leftwing conspiracy of poster makers.
Instigator. Sometimes it just doesn’t seem enough to express an idea in art. It’s important to use art for wider social goals. My long term work with homeless rights groups is one example. in recent years the unionization of adjunct faculty at San FRancisco Art institute where I have been teaching has provided another use of the Instigator power of art. This section includes two political art collectives San Francisco Poster Syndicate and the Great Tortilla Consipracy, in addition to a section on homeless rights and exhibitions of a political instigatorial nature.
Artist. And of course, Artist. It’s not only about politics, there’s also Day of the dead, work inspired by literature, paintings and public art projects. The largest sections are Artist Books and Portfolios (which contains a large nujmber of prints created as series) and a selection of Prints and Posters which are single prints not created to be a part of any series.
Artist Statement
Impresario. Like many artists in the contemporary world I find my life divided. In a culture that values art very little, I have always found it important to work to promote and preserve the work of other artists. If artists don’t care it’s unlikely others will. That’s the area I call Impresario. That encompasses the work I’ve done with artists to get their work out in the world, as well as the work of preserving artists’ work after their death. This section is divided into exhibitions, estates and writings on art.
