Anne-Marie Jennings
Northern News Services

NNSL (Sep 07/98) - Don't ask Wallace Murphy to talk to you about painting.

He'd much rather show you what he does.

"Painting is an emotional act. If you don't enjoy it, you should stop."

Art and painting has played a role in Wallace Murphy's life since he was a young boy. It was his mother who first taught him about painting and encouraged his creative talent.

After graduation from the University of Saskatchewan with a bachelor's degree in fine arts, Murphy came to the North as a teacher, spending 11 years in Inuvik.

Murphy's paintings went on display last week at the Trappers Lake Retreat Centre. It was the first public exhibit of his work since 1985.

Murphy moved from Inuvik to his home in Rae, where he has lived since '92, and the new location has given Murphy new inspiration.

"When we moved to Rae, we told our friends that we didn't buy the house for the house -- we bought it for the view."

Many of the works included in this latest exhibit were inspired by that view, immortalizing the forest fires which raged through the North this summer.

"Our home in Rae looks out on Marian Lake. Most of what I have painted I could see as I sat on our back porch."

The creative process for Murphy is never constant, with each painting taking anywhere from a few days and to a few months.

"Some paintings just fall into place," he says, adding that he will generally have an idea of what he wants to create on the canvas before beginning the piece. Murphy also says that some works come out of the situation at hand.

"I keep all my paint in a pail beside me," he says. "I remember one time I was working with acrylics on a new painting. Because acrylics dry very quickly, you can only work with what's on your palette. So, I finished the painting I was working on and painted a second one with the colours I had on the palette."

Murphy also works from photographs he has taken of the surrounding environment, but finds his artistic sensibilities began to cloud his photography.

"I develop the film myself, but I found that when I was taking photographs I was using different settings and angles. I wasn't taking pictures of what I was actually looking at any more."

"Now I use a camera with an automatic focus lens."

And regardless of whatever else he may be doing, Murphy's need to remain artistic outweighs any other aspect of his daily life.

"When I was teaching in Inuvik I was put in charge of running the school paper," he says. "I would spend most of the time teaching the students about the layout and design of the paper."

"It was the students who told me that if they were going to put out a newspaper, they were going to need words to print."

The works of Wallace Murphy are currently on display at the Trapper's Lake Treatment Centre outside Yellowknife and will be on display through until Sept. 19.