Hailey Clemens
artist | Illustrator | Printmaker
About
Hey, it's me.
Hailey Clemens is a multimedia 2D artist that specializes in printmaking and collage. Their work often reflects themes surrounding identity, queerness, and self-expression. Their work often incorporates vibrant colors, graphic linework, and complimentary text. They are inspired by their childhood interest in comic books. As their career continues, they hope to continue in the field of comic book publishing while pursuing an independent practice in zinemaking and advocacy for queer rights.

Statement
I often grapple with human perception and how I am affected by it. Concepts within my work are drawn from psychological themes that coincide with self-expression. As a non-binary individual, I find it hard to directly explain my lived experience through words, so oftentimes my art reflects these feelings that are otherwise baffling.
While I find myself working with deep themes in more somber tones, I also find a balance in taking time to express lighthearted storytelling in some of my work as well. This includes imagery taken from my interests in comic books, superheroes, and the supernatural.
Overall, my work tends to focus on femininity, spiritual conflict, gender expression, and queerness. I am a 2D, multimedia artist with a focus in relief printmaking and collage. As a collage artist, I believe the easiest way to express inexplicable feelings is to collect segments of imagery and collage them into complete thoughts; much like how the trans experience consists of gathering parts of your identity for yourself, collage allows you to disregard pre-assembled structures that have been laid out for you.
Collage allows me to pick and choose from found materials and construct new meaning, as well as expand on the flat, 2D plane with added textures to create a more sensory engaging experience for viewers. My work has common characteristics such as vibrant colors, graphic linework, and oftentimes text to compliment the forms.
In a particular zine I’ve made, Search for a Scapegoat, I reflect on my upbringing in a religious household and living life as someone conditioned to be and treated as a woman. With a mixture of colored paper collage, pieces of old comics, and linoleum stamps, this project came together in a wild collage of color and figures to tell my story of confusion, estrangement, grief, and the search for something to blame.
