Morgan Murphey is an amazing large-scale oil painter and mixed media artist. He is currently experimenting with sculpture and performative aspects within his work, which he describes as "taking on formal and conceptual issues involving the ecologies of art, applying systems to systems, concentrating on painting's substructure as well as it's contemporary milieu." His work steps between the figurative and the abstract, combining each aspect to create pieces layered with cultural and historical references. He is interested in the almost hero-like reverence painters of the early abstract expressionist era received as well as the idealized and ecclesiastical aesthetics of Classical paintings, working to combine those ideals within a contemporary context. He has a group show coming up in April at Vestibule called "Skulls and Weed" and another with Israel Lund in September.

click to go to Morgan's website.