"Hummingbird at Feeding"

For more than three decades, Todd Murphy explored a practice that combines sculpture, painting and photography. With the inquisitiveness of a 19th century Naturalist, Murphy travelled to the far reaches of the world, collecting, photographing, and fastidiously cataloging everything from melting glaciers, to aviary species, to exotic fruit. His photographic studies of curiosities become sources for complex narratives based on philosophy, mythology, and the supernatural. In his work, Murphy often went beyond these classical prototypes to include subtexts of bigotry, Southern history, and fantastic literary stories. In the end, his recurring protagonists — horses, birds, dresses, and boats — are poetic vehicles for a humanistic discourse. Todd passed away in 2020.