Aileen Murphy in conversation with Casey Walshe
Accompanying text to TENDER, solo exhibition at The RHA Ashford Gallery, Dublin, 2023
How do you start a painting?
I tend to let images, colours and compositions roam around in my mind for any length of time ... without any need to make a sketch. When the need arises I often sketch in either a pocket notebook or on a tracing paper pad. Other times, I use the pen function on my mobile phone, draw what I need to and play around with screengrabs, colour inverters etc. Sometimes I simply hold my phone in my left hand and jot down this idea from earlier onto paper. I then tape tracing paper to the surface (even if it is 6ft high! ) and I'll work out my composition on tracing paper first. I find this part very enjoyable. Shortly after, I define structure and contrast between the background and the motifs - from here it's a long road of building up sections and making it all work as one.
The journey of making a painting, for me, often has a time of particular difficulty which can be disheartening and uncomfortable; it can be pretty dire at times and can bring up fear of failure. At the same time, I feel it's part of the process. How do you relate to this?
It can take months for some of my works to finally come around to being finished. I have often encountered the "disheartening" phase as you call it. For me, "disheartening" isn't really the word I would go for, it's more often a time of frustration, followed by complete lack of interest, and soon - abandonment. The abandonment of the piece is uncomfortable for me and that's where the sense of failure can come in. I keep reminding myself that for every 10 paintings or so, there's 2 or 3 that I have abandoned. And this is very much a part of the process - the 10 new paintings exist and have been resolved and informed by what I learnt while working on the so-called unsuccessful pieces.
Sometimes the most free phase in making a new body of work for me is the other side of this dire phase. Do you feel that difficulty can open new things?
I do agree that difficulty can open new things. Difficulty makes me leave the studio for a while and come back with fresh eyes and new ideas. I've never created a body of work with ease. I tend to enjoy making work the most when I'm getting close to a deadline and I don't have time to overthink. I work a little faster and often allow for more risk taking and playfulness. I'm always curious about what might happen, whether it ends up in the exhibition or not. Occasionally, I'll pick back up an abandoned painting and suddenly, I'll know exactly what to do, and it will come back into the world again. These moments are very rewarding and they likely happen because I have relaxed about pursuing any particular outcome.
Something cracked open in these paintings with colour. What brought about this change?
Good question! I think this has happened because in recent years, I'm feeling confident about my motifs, research and composition, so I've had more time and headspace for colour. Some of the smaller paintings in this exhibition have wooden sections/ frames and motifs overlayed on the wooden surface. I became much more experimental with this work. When I was a child I used to assemble bits of wood together in my grandfather's garage. I would make boxes and little boats and paint them all sorts of colours. When I planned and visualised this exhibition colour became very important. I wanted to pursue it, simply because it made the work very enjoyable to make
I love the exhibition title, Tender. For me, it immediately brings to mind softness, both as an emotional caring feeling and as images of tender meat that is easy to cut. Your paintings are based on motifs of the flower as well as dealing with abstraction and emotion. How does the word tender relate to these paintings for you?
Unusually for this body of new works, the title of the show came to me first, and I built the work around the word "tender". I feel like this word described everything in my life at the time, from my colour palette, to how I approach my job as an artist to how the world around me in general seemed to be. Tender both implies something soft, gentle, and warm, and equally can indicate pain or discomfort. It's important to me that the viewer can sit and take it all in and experience the show as one body of work, where all the paintings link up in some way.
Aileen Murphy (b. 1984, lives and works in Berlin), graduated from the National College of Art and Design, Dublin (2007) and then studied at Städelschule Frankfurt, graduating in 2018. Aileen Murphy is currently resident at the Artist Studio Residency, ISCP, NYC, USA. Recent solo and group exhibitions include Galeria Pelaires, Mallorca, Spain (2023); Deborah Schamoni, Munich, Germany (2022); Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin, Ireland (2022); Amanda Wilkinson Gallery, London, UK (2020).