AGE: the multidimensional aspect of time
Paul Hazelton
2 – 12 July 2026
AGE: the multidimensional aspect of time is an exhibition of work by Paul Hazelton, ranging from works in progress to recent work, to one piece revised in 2026 and 2017 but started over 40 years ago.
As the text by the artist below makes clear, Hazelton’s work and working practices revel in the fragmentary, multidimensional qualities of time and age. ‘Age’ as a verb, gentle or indefatigable, welcome or worrisome; something which bodies, art, our environment do, but also which is done to us. And ‘age’ as a noun, something static: we have an age, we live in (or through) an age. Haven’t we all uttered the hyperbolic complaint, ‘this is taking ages’? Sometimes time torments us with its slowness; at other times with its speed. And then sometimes it heals us, bringing change and growth: that other well-worn phrase, ‘just give it time.’
The Margate School of Art is delighted to present this exhibition by Hazelton, which captures these contradictions, their jeopardy and also their humour, through a practice which encompasses drawing, sculpture, collage and found objects.
Paul Hazelton, who lives and works in Margate, has exhibited in the UK and internationally in many different kinds of spaces, including domestic settings, abandoned buildings, churches and museums. In 2025 he was invited by Art Stays Festival, Slovenia to present a solo exhibition of his dust sculptures at Ptuj Castle. Other solo exhibitions include: Drawn to Dust, Lido Stores, Margate (2023); No Stone Left Unturned, Margate Caves (2020); Lost Property 2071, London Bridge Station (2017); Ghosts in the Making, Viktor Wynd Museum of Curiosities, Natural History and Fine Art, London (2016); Tempus Fugit: Oeuvres de Paul Hazelton, Ecole d’Art de Saint-Omer, France (2016); DNA & Dust, QF Gallery, New York (2013); Turn, Herrick Gallery, London (2012).
Group exhibitions include: Anthropocene, Maximilian Wolfgang Gallery, London (2025); Autres Choses, England & Co, Sotheran’s Building, Piccadilly London (2023); FIAT BULB: The Edison Syndrome, Salone del Mobile Milan (2023); The Wild Thought, The Lido Stores Margate (2023); The Great Imagining, The Ideas Factory, Canning Town, London (2022); Nature Morte, UNC Charlotte, College of Art + Architecture, University Gallery, USA (2022); Miniscule Venice, Fondamenta Sant’ Anna 996, Castello 30122, Venezia (2019); Animals and Us, Turner Contemporary, Margate (2018); Cabinet Da-End 08, Galerie Da-End, 17 rue Guénégaud, 75006 Paris (2018); Nature Morte, Guildhall Museum, London touring from The Four Domes Pavilion, Wroclaw, Poland (2017); Master of All Trades: Ruskin Drawing Prize 2017 shortlisted exhibition, Millennium Gallery, Sheffield (2017).
His work was also recently featured in Michael Petry’s latest book MirrorMirror: The Reflective Surface in Contemporary Art (Thames and Hudson 2024) and in 2025, Hazelton was commissioned to paint a major restoration mural at Margate Shell Grotto.
Paul Hazelton: As humans we do not inhabit a single time. We are composed of many different types of ages simultaneously. When considering age, how do we quantify the mind, For example, an old soul can inhabit a young body. the body the soul? The mind through learning can occupy an ancient wisdom and the body, in its atomic constituent parts, is as old as time itself. We are the sum of all that precedes us. Therefore you could say that we are not the age we think we are. The process of ageing, whether biological or as epochal progression, is aligned with the process of making. Art and Age go hand-in-hand. For example, to experience An Age we often do so through the artist’s medium, whether that’s through a piece of writing, a play, a painting, a sculpture, a piece of music, dance. Each shifts our perspective and therefore our perception of Age Age is seasoned by Art and Time. We are seasoned by age H takes his time....... Then gives that time space ink cutting paint paper scoring glass and shape In dust mirror lines drawing.