In Hyperallergic’s recent feature “Catherine Murphy Has Her Cake and Eats It Too,” critic John Yau admires Murphy’s rich perceptual complexity and explores her subversive play between realism and abstraction. After spending decades with Murphy’s work and writing the monograph on her paintings and drawings, he describes the experience of viewing her work as “just scratching the surface.”
Well known for her observational paintings, Catherine Murphy’s drawings and prints hold just as much mystery and depth. What captures the play between realism and abstraction better than a drawing of a map? Catherine Murphy’s lithograph, “Blackboard Map of Colorado” captures the nuances of chalk lines drawn in negative space, questioning the very nature of a rectangle on a spherical globe, and what it means to represent space.
Blackboard Map of Colorado, Catherine Murphy, 20” x 28.75 image on 28” x 37” paper, 1992.
The lithograph was printed at Corridor Press with master printer, Tim Sheesley, who describes the collaboration as “a great privilege to work with one of the most skillful drawing artist I have ever worked with.” The image was drawn directly on a large Bavarian limestone in Murphy’s studio and derived from a drawing of the same image she had made on a blackboard with white chalk. The print not only captures the nuances of chalk lines drawn in negative space, erasures and fine chalk dust but also questions the very nature of a rectangle on a globe in spherical geometry. At first glance the print looks ordinary until enough time is spent observing the tremendous amount of skillful observation required to create such a lithographic tour de force.
At first glance the print looks ordinary until enough time is spent observing the tremendous amount of skillful observation require to create such a lithographic tour de force. Catherine’s skill and approach to this subject is perfectly honed to be drawn on the sensitive surface of Bavarian limestone. The resulting lithograph is a slow burn breathtaking result of her brilliant vision.