Painting plays a pivotal role in Hayley Tompkins’ work. While she has made colourful abstract works using the traditional medium of watercolour on paper, she has also applied her distinctive palette of muted greens, ochre tones and bright sherbets to a wide array of everyday, found objects such as hammers, bottles, knives, chairs, twigs, mobile phones and fragments of clothing. All of these materials are carefully worked on by Tompkins to amplify their particular qualities and suggest new possibilities and identities.