The Shadow of Sirius — Jennifer Murphy

“What makes a desert beautiful,” said the little prince, “is that it hides a well, somewhere.”
– Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Although I have worked in collage since I was a child, I really began to explore large-scale, sculptural collage after the death of a dear friend and close collaborator ten years ago. The work was a way to cope with the grief but also an outlet to hope. This series comes at another time of loss, both personal and I believe collective. We now live in a time of ecological mourning and are in desperate need for paths to rediscover hope.

I began this work thinking about The Tommy Thompson Park and the Leslie Spit here in Toronto. This dump site of rubble and rebar on the shores of Lake Ontario, this “accidental wilderness” of trees, wildflowers, lagoons and submerged reefs. This decades-old landfill, re-activated habitat to migrating and mating birds and insects, amphibians and mammals. I gravitated to thinking about shore birds and waders, those stilt like birds astride that liminal space between earth, air and water.

While making this new body of work I also discovered the American poet and ecologist W.S. Merwin, (1927 – 2019). Merwin’s poetry speaks of memory and of loss, the continuum of time, ecology and hope. Working on eighteen acres of wrecked earth at his home on the island of Maui, W.S. Merwin created a garden of palm trees that became The Merwin Conservatory. The most bio-diverse garden of palm species in the world, was grown on land that was once ruined by pineapple plantations.

I find hope in making my work and in places of ruin where wildflowers grow, and in the poetry of those who have felt immense loss but continue to create.

– Jennifer Murphy, Toronto, September 2019