Layers Artist Spotlight: Matt Murphy

UPDATED CATEGORIES: Spotlight | Web Editor | November 13, 2008

Watch the video for the entire interview with Matt Murphy:

Layers: What kind of artistic background did you start in?
Matt Murphy: I started in the fine arts and moved into photography. I worked as a photographic assistant for 6 years and during that time, the industry was starting to go digital. In the studio we were using computers more and more. It was from there, using the computers to manipulate the images at a basic level.

Layers: Why the transition from photographs to illustration?
Matt Murphy:I suppose I just got to the point where I was only able to do so much with the photographs and the ideas I was having were being limited. I wanted to go less realistic and more fantasy. Photoshop allows you to have more control over the image.

Layers: Is it easier to tell a story with your work in illustrator than in photography?
Matt Murphy:For me personally it is. I find it easier to take a story and use Photoshop and Illustrator to put my ideas together. It allows me to be far more creative.

Layers: Tell us a little bit of back story behind the image “Corridor”
Matt Murphy:It was part of a series of 4 images. It has to do with solitude. I was living in London at the time and taking the tube home every night. Working in a studio, I wouldn’t finish work until anywhere between seven and midnight. The later it got, the more people you see going home on their own. It really sparked the idea in my head of all these people randomly going home on their own at the same time. Underground stations are amazing to me - really inspired places.

Layers: I felt a little bit of James Dean when I saw it
Matt Murphy:Yeah, I think there’s some of that in there. I really wanted to do a homage to Edward Hopper.

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