Margaret E. Murray
Svalbard Pieta, copper etching, 9x12 inches.
Arctic Flow II, copper etching, 9x12 inches.
Meeting Myself on the Road, copper etching, 6x6 inches.
Lowcountry, copper etching, 9x12 inches.
Heat Trap, monotype, 15x15 inches.
Artic Floe I, copper etching with chine collé, 9x12 inches.
Interstices, copper etching with chine collé, 9x12 inches.
Marsh, copper etching with chine collé, 9x12 inches.
Glacial Melt, copper etching and aquatint, 9x12 inches.
Sand Bar, Low Tide, photopolymer intaglio, 8x10 inches.
Printmaking is hands-on and old school. Working with copper, linoleum, acid, lye, ink, small tools, paper, and a mechanical printing press connects me to centuries of artists, makers, and communicators. I control some of the results of my experimentations, but the materials and processes have a say, too, and the dialogue inspires me to keep going.
My recent work depicts abstract landscapes, including places I have known, yearned for, or imagined. I am drawn to coastlines, the edges of things, wherever land meets tidal water. Birds-eye views of landscapes – ice, seashores, crop lands, and fields – and time spent near oceans, ice pack, and marshlands inspire the colors, shapes, compositions, and textures of my prints. Through experimentation with my materials, I create images of natural and imaginary environments. I hope to inspire viewers to imagine their own treasured landscapes, real or ideal.
Born and raised in the District of Columbia, Margaret E. Murray has lived in San Francisco for most of her life. Inspired by living at the edge of the continent near the vast Pacific Ocean, she returns frequently to the south Atlantic coast and has spent time in the Caribbean, Australia, and the Arctic. Her abstract landscapes in intaglio, relief, and monotype emphasize color, shape, texture, and pattern.
Murray is an artist in residence at KALA Art Institute in Berkeley and a past member of Graphic Arts Workshop in San Francisco. She has exhibited her work locally and nationally. Murray studied printmaking at the City College of San Francisco, KALA, Crown Point Press, and the San Francisco Center for the Book and holds a BA in Semiotics from Brown University and a JD from the University of California Hastings College of the Law. Making has been her way of life since she was a child, and pressing ink into paper is a thrill hard-wired into her by her great-grandfather, a Scottish letterpress man.
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