murph work

The Short Story

(click on image for larger picture.)

The long story is under
construction

--Robbin Murphy



30

1977

BFA in painting from Fort Wright College of the Holy Names in Spokane, Washington.

Graduate school at Indiana University, Bloomington, awarded Ford Foundation Fellowship. Walk by Kinsey Institute for Sex Research every morning on way to studio.

Painting faculty at Indiana put me on probation for not making paintings. We disagree. I leave Indiana.


Move to New York with a suitcase and $500. Brooklyn for a year, then 24th Street in Manhattan with Jess. Hang out at Uncle Charlie's Midtown, Stix, Rounds, Cowboys (and cowgirls), Studio 54, Ice Palace, Pyramid Club.

Work at Grey Advertising,
then Vogue Magazine.
Art work at night.

Quit corporate job to concentrate on my art work. People at Vogue roll their eyes.

Support myself working lobster shifts in type shops and painting lofts. Lose weight but gain sanity.

Digital typsetting introduced. I learn UNIX and C and hate computers with a passion.

East Village Art Scene develops. I start investigating visual perception and the structure of memory.

Hang out at The Bar, The World, Save the Robots and The Baths. Numerous ephemeral amorous encounters.

31

1980


32

1985

Move to Chelsea Hotel then 11th Street between B and C and finally to 2nd Street between 1st and 2nd Ave.

Drawing Center Selections show.

Join ACT UP
Organize "ACT UP at White Columns"

Beat up by cops while watching Tompkins Square Park riot. File lawsuit against city.


Start selling work.
Meet the "Art Ladies."

Rent studio on Grand Street in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

Show at Simon Watson on Lafayette Street in New York, Meyers/Bloom in LA.

Interest in how art objects are displayed and circulate.

Do lots of work. Swim every day at Metropolitan City pool.

Finally stop working in type shops and painting lofts to live.

Settle lawsuit with city.
Make enough money to pay off some credit cards.

Travel in Greece and Italy for three weeks.

34

1990

36

1990

37

1990


35

1991

Move to Rosa Esman Gallery in New York.

Meyers/Bloom in LA closes. They ship work to Rosa Esman. Three pieces stolen from back of truck during delivery.

Rosa closes gallery in the middle of a group show, puts most of my work in storage. One piece I get back slashed with a razor.

Iola murdered by her grandson.

Three close friends die of AIDS within three months of each other.


Go back to lobster shift in type shops.

Give up studio in Williamsburg, apartment turns back into a studio.

33

1992


notesVIII

1992

Go back to school in Museum Studies at NYU.

Continue to make art.

Discover Internet.
Learn to like computers.
Take every free computer class.

Learn NYU is full of academic crooks.

Investigate pictorial relationship between text, image and language. Digital.

Type shops start closing, no more jobs. Live off student loans and credit cards.


Create artnetweb with Remo Campopiano.

NYU won't accept artnetweb as a master's thesis project. Quit school to do it on my own.

Rosa Esman throws my work out when I don't pay the storage fee.

Pieces start showing up in galleries, and at auction.

People start asking me if I have any work to sell.

I decide to retire from artworlds.

diptych

1996


back to robbin murphy's home page

murph@artnetweb.com