Tyler Hazlett
Tyler Hazlett is a visual artist from San Diego, California. They received a Bachelor of Arts from California State University San Marcos and are completing a Master of Fine Arts at Azusa Pacific University. Working primarily in charcoal drawing, Hazlett explores themes of memory, loss, and human connection, creating work that reflects on the emotional traces people leave behind. Their practice is rooted in careful observation and an interest in how personal experiences shape identity and relationships.
Artist Statement
My work explores the ways people continue to shape us long after they are gone. Whether through death, the end of a relationship, or the quiet fading of connection, absence leaves behind its own presence. I am interested in the emotional residue of these experiences and the subtle ways they alter how we remember, perceive, and move through the world.
Working primarily in charcoal, I embrace a medium that is both delicate and permanent. Charcoal can be erased, smudged, and layered, mirroring the instability of memory while leaving traces that cannot be completely removed. The physical act of drawing becomes a process of searching, obscuring, and revealing, much like the way we revisit moments and relationships over time.
Rather than documenting specific people or events, my drawings create spaces where viewers can reflect on their own experiences of loss, change, and remembrance. I am drawn to the quiet moments that often accompany grief: the lingering habit of expecting someone to be there, the objects that become charged with memory, and the realization that those who leave us continue to exist in the ways they have shaped us.
Exhibitions and collections
Aftertouch
Solo Exhibitions
Duke Gallery, Azusa — 2026. MFA Thesis exhibition
Convergence
Group Shows
Sasse Museum of Art, Pomona — 2025.