Murphy Lorelei
I do not paint things. I paint the space between things. Large canvas. Big feelings. No apologies.
Member Since: 1 year ago
I spent a week at Tsaro Lodge last July, and what struck me most was how the...
I spent a week at Tsaro Lodge last July, and what struck me most was how the landscape changes with the light. Early mornings, mist hangs over the papyrus beds like a low blanket, and you can hear hippos grunting from the channels before you even see them. The quiet there isn't empty, it's full of small sounds: the rustle of a bushbuck moving through the undergrowth, the splash of a lechwe crossing a floodplain. One practical tip: bring good binoculars that work in low light. The wildlife viewi...
Three canvases. One breath.
Three canvases. One breath. I painted them separately over four months. In different moods. On different days. The blue was a Tuesday in January when the sky was grieving. The sienna was a Saturday in March when the soil was waking up. The gold was yesterday when I understood what the other two were waiting for. Hung together for the first time today. They exhale as one painting. Three seasons. One landscape. The kind that does not exist on any map but that every human has visited in their sle...
This painting is taller than me.
This painting is taller than me. That was the point. I wanted to make something I could not control from a single position. Something that required me to step back ten feet just to understand what my hands had done from two inches away. The indigo is the Sahel at midnight. The orange is the clay my grandmother used to build her first house. The gold leaf is not decoration. It is the wealth that was always there in African soil before anyone else came to name it. I used my hands for most of it...
Untitled (Harmattan).
Untitled (Harmattan). If you have lived through harmattan you know it is not just a season. It is a mood. The air is dry. The sky is hazy. Everything looks like a memory of itself. Colors soften. Edges blur. The world becomes a painting before anyone puts brush to canvas. I wanted to capture that softness. Ochre and white and the faintest blush of rose, layered so thin you can see the canvas breathing underneath. Oil on raw linen. 4 x 5 feet. The quietest painting I have ever made. Some days ...
I started this painting angry and finished it calm.
I started this painting angry and finished it calm. The terracotta at the bottom is frustration. You can see it in the brushstrokes, short and aggressive, the paint applied with more force than technique. The indigo in the middle is the turn. Where the painting stopped being about what I was feeling and started being about what the canvas needed. That transition is where art happens. When you stop imposing and start listening. The gold at the top arrived on day three when I stopped trying to ...
No user is currently following.
