May Artist of the Month
Meet Michael Murphy
Michael Murphy has had multiple chances to expand his universe in his 71 years and continues on his 53-year-old artistic journey to this point in his life. He grew up in Texas and after high school, he attended art school at Texas Tech University, studying painting, drawing, and printmaking. Life took him in a different direction after his graduation, however, and Michael pursued a career in education, believing he was being pointed toward a world of teaching and working with students. After a successful career as a teacher, assistant principal, principal, director, assistant superintendent and superintendent, Michael turned to working with schools across North and South America as a national leadership coach, trainer, planning facilitator, and consultant. He has been fortunate to have continued his consulting work for 15 years.
In spite of his important work with school leaders, Michael never lost his love of design and art in architecture, nature, and abstraction. So, after a move to the Boston area and with the support of his family, he was able to rearrange his life, retire, and expand his personal world to involve the production of paintings, drawings, and prints to showcase his emotions and thoughts. He was also fortunate to have found the Wellesley Society of Artists as an important part of his work, and he currently is the vice-president of the WSA. Michael’s exploration takes him to expressive abstraction as he studies design, form, shape, mood, motion, and color.
Michael explains: “My images come to me softly and often with just a whisper—there is beauty in the moment when you have inspiration and clarity for the work. That whisper, the softness, may become a roar with time on the canvas. Whatever the canvas transition becomes, I want my works to project a sense of surprise, wonder, movement, and love for the new, unknown, or unspoken. It may take me to project an uplifting moment or a moment of despair. I let the immediacy the paint on canvas to take me where it wants to go.”
Michael welcomes your contact and can be reached at michaelmurphy@murphysoftmodernart.com