Eileen Murray
— Eileen Murray —
Artist Statement
My work is an inquiry into domestic space using the language of painting and ceramics. What makes a house a home? How does one evoke a sense of history, memory, legacy, and narrative? My paintings and ceramics flirt with the line between fine art and decoration, using both trending and vintage colours, patterns, and objects that evoke the quotidian, the nostalgic, and the rituals held within domestic space.
I am interested in contemporary depictions of the home found in advertising, television, and social media. Consumer culture sells the image of a home as a place of perfect harmony and family life where happy memories and boundless imagination are promised through the designer goods and curated spaces that evoke feelings of nostalgia, vintage simplicity and nostalgic elegance. My paintings play with the unattainability of these states by moving between representation and abstraction, expressing oppositions such as Beauty and ugliness; disruption and continuity; and finally through the research of both contemporary and historical paintings.
My most recent body of work is a series of large paintings depicting still life floral arrangements. Drawing on the long history of still life, these works continue to explore notions of excess, while also reflecting on the transience of life. Working through the COVID pandemic, these works have moved from reflections of personal loss to a pervasive experience of collective grief, anxiety, and transformation.
Throughout my work there is a fascination with representations of domesticity, and how these representations dovetail with notions of gender and femininity. I amplify these connections using a visual language that evokes the ethos of the baroque when theatricality, bravado, and material excess conveyed the emotion and movement of the domestic and the palatial.
M. Eileen Murray
