Sam King and Matt Murphy approach the problem of abstraction from different points of view, but also with many shared visions that move them beyond the formal. King challenges illusionistic preconceptions by building, scraping, and exposing the material of the paint itself, hinting at space, light, and narrative. Using color, accumulated mark, and literal shape, Murphy sets up space discomposed by its own elements.

Through improvisation and drastic revision, King steers his paintings into uneasy resolutions of perceptual, emotional, and interpersonal experience, where suggestion trumps declaration and awkward harmonies abound. King sometimes paints on found (or deliberately misshaped) panels that complicate budding pictorial relationships and nudge at the paintings’ objecthood.

Murphy’s exploration of ideas in abstraction has prompted a move toward the realm of object-making, allowing drawings, paintings, and wooden constructions to inform each other. Paintings happen alongside drawings, which happen alongside collages and constructions. Their development is non-linear. Murphy is interested in how different modes of presentation can be deployed to express similar ideas within abstraction. These ideas are about metaphor, geometry, fantastic narrative, and materiality. They draw from a variety of sources, from astronomy to El Greco.