Elizabeth Maw

Artist’s Inspiration

Liz Maw’s practice is rooted in experimentation and material-led enquiry, exploring the relationship between drawing, sculpture, line, and space. Rather than beginning with a predetermined outcome, Maw allows each work to develop through an intuitive process of making and discovery. Her research considers line as a physical object rather than simply a mark or representation, challenging the boundaries between two-dimensional drawing and three-dimensional form. Through constructed structures, she investigates how lines can float, intersect, extend, and cast shadows, transforming the familiar language of drawing into something tangible and spatial. Her recent explorations of colour further demonstrate her willingness to embrace spontaneity, allowing simple marks, shapes, and unexpected colour combinations to guide the creative process.

Aesthetic

Maw’s work combines structural precision with a sense of openness, movement, and visual lightness. Working with steel and other materials, she creates sculptural forms that explore balance, tension, weight, and containment. Welding has become central to her practice, enabling her to extend lines into space while allowing the visible welds to record the physical gestures and processes of making. Alongside her sculptural work, her Chromatology series explores colour through playful arrangements of shapes, marks, and overlapping tones. The relationship between screen-prints and sculptures creates a dialogue between two and three dimensions, with shared colours and forms uniting the works while allowing each medium its own distinct presence. The result is a practice that balances considered construction with intuitive experimentation, inviting viewers to experience line, colour, and form in new ways.

Why You Should Acquire the Work of Liz Maw

Liz Maw’s work offers collectors an exciting exploration of contemporary drawing and sculpture, bringing together material innovation, spatial awareness, and a distinctive sensitivity to form. Her sculptural pieces possess both a strong architectural presence and an intriguing sense of delicacy, with intersecting lines and cast shadows creating changing relationships with their surroundings. Her explorations of colour introduce an additional dimension to her practice, offering vibrant and engaging works that complement her more structural compositions. With a background in media and public relations, a Fine Art degree from Norwich University of the Arts, and ongoing postgraduate study supported by the Dubery and Brogden Scholarship, Maw is developing a thoughtful and distinctive artistic voice. Awarded the Norfolk Contemporary Art Society’s New Makers Prize and invited to join Norwich 20 Group as a graduate member, she is an emerging artist whose work offers collectors the opportunity to engage with a compelling and evolving contemporary practice.