Elizabeth Murray was born
in Chicago in 1940. She earned a BFA at the Art Institute of Chicago
and an MFA from Mills College in Oakland, California. A pioneer
in painting, Murray’s distinctively shaped canvases break with
the art-historical tradition of
illusionistic
space in two-dimensions. Jutting out from the wall and sculptural
in form, Murray’s paintings and watercolors playfully blur
the line between the painting as an object and the painting as a
space for depicting objects. Her still lifes are reminiscent of
paintings by masters such as Cézzane, Picasso, and Matisse;
however, like her entire body of work, Murray’s paintings rejuvenate
old art forms. Breathing life into domestic subject matter, Murray’s
paintings often include images of cups, drawers, utensils, chairs,
and tables. These familiar objects are matched with cartoonish fingers
and floating eyeballs—macabre images that are as nightmarish
as they are goofy. Taken in as a whole, Murray’s paintings
are
abstract
compositions
rendered in bold colors and multiple layers of paint. But the details
of the paintings reveal a fascination with dream states and the
psychological underbelly of domestic life. The recipient of many
awards, Murray received the Skowhegan Medal in Painting in 1986,
the Larry Aldrich Prize in Contemporary Art in 1993, and a John
D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Award in 1999. Her work
is featured in many collections, including the Walker Art Center,
the Museum of Modern Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the
Art Institute of Chicago, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los
Angeles. Elizabeth Murray lived and worked in New York, and died in August 2007.
For additional biographic & bibliographic information:
PaceWildenstein, New York
Elizabeth Murray on the Art21 blog |
