Steppin' Out: Stephen Murphy

In his career as a photographer and teacher, Stephen Murphy has challenged himself and his students with examining historical alternative processes after a mastery of darkroom and digital photography. Since retiring in 2015, Murphy has focused on his own work. One avenue of exploration has been the use of photography in the encaustic medium.
 
Recently Murphy was introduced to blending the encaustic medium with traditional screen-printing from photographs onto birch panels. Developed and still being refined here in Chicago by an encaustic painter, this unique alternative photographic process invites an intuitive exploration of applied color such as tinted gessos and oilsticks while manipulating the beeswax with a torch. Working primarily at the Bridgeport Art Center, Murphy has created a new body of work with imagery sourced from his adopted city of Chicago.
 
Concurrently, he has been "experimenting with the ubiquitous and often castigated mobile camera, drilling down into apps and cross-fertilizing them for their creative potential."