Heiyi Tam was born and raised in Hong Kong and moved to the UK when she was 15. The subtleties of the merging of the East and West, through landscapes, cultures and cuisines often seep into her subconscious during creation. She often works instinctively, creating form before concept. As the composition comes to fruition, she immerses herself into the painting and its colour palette, allowing herself to be informed by past memories, emotions, feelings, and flavours which determine the trajectory of the piece and its title. Tam draws upon the sensory aspects of her chosen memory such as the taste, scent and tactile sensations associated with it to reconstruct the moment itself.

The way she paints is ‘joyfully chaotic’. Working in layers and fluid movements, moments of clarity and interruptions within the details often reveal forgotten feelings as she reconstructs specific moments and encapsulates the sensations tethered to them. Tam’s work questions present realities through reimagined emotional landscapes from the past. It revolves around the fragility and intangibility of memories, and the desire to preserve them. There is resistance to attaching concrete meaning in her work with a focus on accepting the fluidity of fragmented and reconstructed memories, moments, and stories that demand to be felt.

Heiyi Tam (b.1998, Hong Kong) lives and works in London. Her work is inspired by the fallibility of memories and the ephemerality of everyday moments. She explores sensorial qualities of specific moments such as the bursts of sweetness from strawberries or the smell and textures of freshly cut grass. She recently graduated in MA Art and Science from Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London (2021-2023) with First Class Honours. She also recently received The Other Art Fair: New Futures Award 2023, was shortlisted for the Tension Graduate Prize 2023 and was longlisted for the Jackson’s Painting Prize 2023. In 2022, she was the runner-up in the Tiepolo Blue Art Competition, judged by artist Maggi Hambling CBE. She was also awarded the fourth prize in the Landmark Art Prize after being shortlisted in the Top 50.