Artist living and working in Sheffield Studio holder at S1 Artspace Visitor Experience Assistant at The Hepworth Wakefield
Awards YVAN Microgrant, 2019 Open Scholarship, St Edmund Hall, 2018 Vivien Leigh Prize, 2018 The Peel Award, 2017 John Farthing Prize for Human Anatomy, 2016
Selected groups exhibitions include: Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize, Trinity Buoy Wharf London (2021); Portraits of S1, Site Gallery Sheffield (2020); Being Human Festival, School of Advanced Study, London (2019); Symbols, Cupola Gallery, Sheffield (2019); Fronteer, 35 Chapel Walk Gallery, Sheffield (2019); Cast Doorways, 35 Chapel Walk Gallery, Sheffield (2018); Ruskin Degree Show, Ruskin School of Art, Oxford (2018); The Art of Anatomy, St John’s College, Oxford (2018); Tenderfoot #5, APG Gallery, Sheffield (2017); Ruskin Summer Show, Ruskin School of Art, Oxford (2017); Interim, St Edmund Hall, Oxford (2017); Tenderfoot #4, APG Gallery, Sheffield (2016) Solo exhibitions include: The Heartless Hurt Less, The Art House, Sheffield (2019)
Education Fine Art at The Ruskin School of Art, Oxford University (First Class Honours) 2015 - 2018 Foundation Degree in Fine Art at Chesterfield College, 2012 - 2013
Jessica Heywood is a Sheffield based artist working predominately in drawing and textiles. Her practice often explores the ideas of abjection, women’s work and labour in a domestic context. In her most recent series “The Heartless Hurt Less”, Heywood’s focuses on abjection. Looking at the boundary between life and death, observing the beauty and fragility of our everyday natural environments. Heywood captures their bodies in considered and meticulous detail, honouring the found deceased creatures by providing them with an identity which otherwise would be ignored or forgotten. Labour intensive methods of creating provides Heywood with on-going influence of what defines and separates Fine Art from Craft. As women’s art is rooted in a long history of traditional craft practices but was denied the title of ‘Art’, Heywood continues to further explore how gender is intrinsically linked to craft. Heywood aims to elevate the mediums of ‘domestic art’ of crochet, needlework, and embroidery to ‘fine art’.