As a member of the Scratch Orchestra and the Portsmouth Symphonia in the 1960’s he had been influenced at the age of 15 years largely by the work of John Cage, and the Dadas.

He was married at 18 years and became a Painter and Decorator in and around the village of Rowlands Castle, Hampshire; later a Coal-Packer on an industrial site in Nuneaton in the West Midlands and a Night Work Postman for 13 years. He is the Biological Father of two Sons who he has only recently been in touch with, again.

He has also been a University Lecturer since 1989 after completing a BA (Hons) with a 1^st in Painting at Coventry University; an MA in Art History and Theory at the University of Essex and also an M.Phil at the University of Essex. He has been a University Lecturer since 1989 until the present day beginning at the University of Coventry, the University College of Chester, and the University of Northampton (part-time), and he has also taught for the Open University at Summer Schools.

During the period in which he was writing his dissertation for his PhD at Essex University he worked at the studio of Tom Phillips RA as an archivist having met and worked with the painter, writer and composer at Wolverhampton Technical College in 1969.

He has been married to Florence Marlene Hays for 30 years who has accompanied him on his travels to most conferences over time.

Ian has given papers at:

• International James Joyce Conferences since Dublin’s Centenary Conference dedicated to Leopold Bloom (Ulysses) in 2004
• The Slought Foundation at the University of Pennsylvania 2004 for the William Anastasi Pataphysical Society
• Cambridge University at the Common Ground Humanities Conference in 2005
• The International James Joyce Conference at Cornell University, Ithaca, New York in 2005
• The University of Budapest at the International James Joyce Conference in 2006
• the American University in Paris Arts in Society Conference 2006;
• The University of Texas at Austin in 2007 for the International James Joyce Conference
• The International James Joyce Conference at the François Rabelais University in Tours, France, in 2008
• Birmingham University at the Arts in Society Conference where he also held a small one-man show of his printed visual work in 2008
• The International James Joyce Conference at the University of Buffalo, New York in 2009.
• The International James Joyce Conference at Charles University in Prague in 2010. "A Major Exhibition…" (The James Joyce Broadsheet) of ten of Hays' large prints on the subject of Shem the Pen of Finnegans Wake and images and texts on Duchamp's writings and images were displayed at the Conference venue in the Department of Philosophy under the auspices of Charles University and Hypermedia Joyce Studies. The exhibition was mounted with the help of David Vichnar and Louis Armand of the University with posters created by the University utilising book covers created by the artist for a Hypermedia Studies publication.