Oil on linen mounted on panel
2022
In found midcentury photographs, clichés like suburban cowboys appear as American kitsch, almost comforting in their familiarity. Artist Meghan Murray examines these motifs, parsing out Kodachrome color cast, pouring over the 35 mm slide memories of a stranger with both nostalgia and a cold disaffection. Murray finds herself complicit in a history written by the figures in these photos. In this work, Murray reimagines the humor and warmth of the Christmas season, and the obsession with the western television genre, especially during the 1960s and 1970s. In elevating a discarded snapshot to the historical context of painting and by engaging with the snapshot as both archival object and image, Murray encourages critical viewing of emblematic themes. The titles Murray uses for her works are found in the New York Times archives, from the same year that the original photo was printed, in a way to challenge the temporality - or lack thereof - in the image.
