Hazel Dooney was the first Australian artist, perhaps the first globally, to walk away from the traditional commercial gallery system in late 2004 to connect directly with the audience for her work via the internet.

Hazel held her first solo exhibition in 1997. In 2001, after three more successful solo exhibitions at a commercial gallery – and features in Vogue, Belle and Marie Claire magazines in response to press releases directly from the artist – she completed an expedition to Lake Eyre with nine well-established older male artists, including John Olsen AO OBE, which resulted in a coffee-table book and touring exhibition.

The artist commissioned her first website in 2003, designed by Kate Linton with software engineering by Petras Surna of Yart Pty Ltd.

In July 2006 Hazel was featured on the front page of the Business Section (Ed. Michael Short) of The Age newspaper in an article by Nabila Ahmed, ‘State-of-the-art selling rivals play to the galleries’. On 13 August 2006 Hazel’s first essay, ‘Life Study’ was published in 'The Next Big Thing', Edition 13 of Griffith Review (Ed. Julianne Schultz). She began her controversial, widely read blog ‘Self vs Self’ on 23 August. ‘Life Study’ was re-published by The Australian Financial Review on 15 September 2006 (pp. 6-7), retitled ‘In front is a precipice, behind are wolves: Hazel Dooney walks the razor's edge between respect and celebrity in today's art world’.

By 2010, Hazel had been featured in all major newspapers and print publications in Australia; her artwork was auctioned by Christie’s London; and she was emerging in America. In 2011 the artist was included as a case study in the university textbook Strategy, Theory and Practice (Stewart R Clegg, Christos Pitelis, Jochen Schweitzer, Andrea Whittle, pp. 269-271) published by Sage and currently in its third edition. She also delivered her first public speech, at TEDx Brisbane.

The artist took a hiatus from 2012 to 2017 for intensive treatment at a private psychiatric hospital to recover from trauma. During this time she created her first public artwork, ‘Ten Dicta for Young Women Who Are Artists’ (Melbourne CBD, 2013 – 2022) and wrote ‘Broken’ published in Women & Power (Griffith Review Edition 40, Ed. Julianne Schultz). An edited extract was published in Good Weekend Magazine insert in The Age newspaper and Sydney Morning Herald, 13 April 2013. ‘Broken’ was included in The Best Australian Essays 2013 (Ed. Robert Manne) alongside Helen Garner and Robert Dessaix. In mid 2017 Hazel returned to Sydney and, on the advice of Petras Surna, built a new website for herself.

From 2019 to 2021 Hazel worked on a private international portrait commission series and, until mid 2022, developed new work under the patronage of venture capitalist Mark Carnegie. In April 2022 she began writing a column at Coagula Art Journal, founded and edited by American art critic Mat Gleason. Her essay ‘The Future of Art Fraud’ was published in Griffith Review, Issue 79 Counterfeit Culture, February 2023 (Ed. Carody Culver). Hazel completed several more large portrait commissions.

In October 2024 the artist advised Australia’s leading arts critic, John McDonald, on digital strategy after he was fired at short notice from Sydney Morning Herald and Australian Financial Review. Within four weeks he became a best-selling author on Substack. After providing the concept and developing and executing initial strategy to establish Everything the artworld doesn’t want you to know, Hazel delivered further original ideas and strategy for long term independent growth at www.everythingthe.com before returning focus to her own work in February 2025.

Hazel is currently in the early stages of launching multiple series of new artworks. Each will be available on completion (with collectors notified by email and works shown online via @hazeldooney at Instagram and @dooneyTV at YouTube) with global delivery by courier. In response to requests, she also writes a regular column, Digital Strategy for Creators, at After Studio Hours.