Todd Murphy: Sovereign Tree
Overview
Jackson Fine Art is honored to present established artist Todd Murphy’s large-scale photographs from his new series titled Sovereign Tree. Primarily known for his paintings and sculptures, Murphy’s work can be described as having “underlying artistic themes of metamorphosis, illusion, and life-in-the moment.” Through constantly reinventing the mediums that he employs, Murphy does not conform strictly to one medium. However, Murphy has used photography as the foundation of his work throughout his career seen in his paintings and as studies for his sculptural work.
In the Sovereign Tree, Murphy uses photography and digital technology to seamlessly piece together segments of a climbing tree. These photographs represent an array of multicolored species of birds and the changing seasons, often seen in early landscape paintings 17th century Holland. Murphys’ project was initially created for a mixed-use tower, Sovereign, in Buckhead. The Sovereign Tree, coined by Mr. Murphy, is an installation of large-scale light-boxes placed in the entrance hall of 20 residential floors. The continuity and a threading of the floors together represented “a metamorphosing segments of a continuous tree and varied specimens of birds, paying tribute to Atlanta’s deep roots and cultural evolution.” Jackson Fine Art will be exhibiting small-scale representation of this project, 30 x 60 photographs based on the light-boxes. These images spill their secrets and as you look closely you are rewarded with jeweled images branches laced with leaves with select images reminiscent of Pollack’s abstract paintings.
Works
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Untitled, Sovereign Tree (bluetits in willow branches), 2009
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Untitled, Sovereign Tree (cardinals branches), 2009
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Untitled, Sovereign Tree (eagle branches with clouds), 2009
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Untitled, Sovereign Tree (hummingbird branches), 2009
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Untitled, Sovereign Tree (kestrel branches), 2009
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Untitled, Sovereign Tree (kingfisher branches), 2009