This painting/collage is one of a series made with materials gathered from a 17th century house in Hackney, while I was preparing for an exhibition there in 2023. I made ink with weeds from the rubble-strewn garden and pieces of discarded building material, gathered soot from the chimneys and ground up old bricks and clay from builder’s exploratory holes in the ground. I like to see what my materials can do on paper. Tidelines form as the ink dries in irregular blots, branching patterns emerge as paint responds to pressure. I select and collage these together, encouraging new forms to grow out of the old house.
Working with paint and print processes and found materials, Sam Hodge explores cycles of material transformation over different timescales and the entanglement of humans with their environment. Sam Hodge studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge University and Painting Conservation at The Courtauld Institute of Art and then worked as a painting conservator including at Tate. She began focusing on making her own work in 2008 and since then has exhibited widely in the UK and abroad. Her most recent solo exhibitions: Unfolding: Packaging the Earth at Velorose Gallery, London (2025); Every Contact Leaves a Trace at 195 Mare Street, Hackney (2023); Unfolding, Alder Gallery, Dunkeld (2024). Recent group shows include: UPCYCLE, GPS Gallery, London; Nature The Artist curated by The Great Imagining, London: The Ground Beneath our Feet, GroundWork Gallery, Kings Lynn. Opens include: RA Summer exhibition, Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, Wells Art Contemporary, Creekside Biennial, International Print Biennale. Her work has been acquired by The Met and MoMA in NY
