Joel Taylor Murnan (b. 1997 Grass Valley, CA) pursued his education at the San Francisco Art Institute and obtained a B.F.A. in Sculpture from California College of the Arts. Currently, he is a M.F.A candidate at the University of California, Davis. Most recently, Murnan was selected as an Artist in Residence for Tropical Lab 2024 in Singapore, showcasing his work in a collective exhibition. Murnan’s work explores themes of land and control, drawing inspiration from his childhood memories of a pastoral landscape. Murnan’s sculptures capture the mood of the terrain, utilizing diverse mediums that offer a unique perspective on our relationship with the land.
Monsters, present in nearly every culture, reflect collective uncertainty. In my body of work, I explore the monster as a symbol and examine how it has shaped human perceptions of landscapes. A monster’s traits are shaped by the elements of a particular time or place. My sculptures draw on this tradition, channeling the monster as a manifestation of our moment in history.
The monsters I create are made from objects found on the ground. Textures and shapes merge, incorporating elements like rotting wood, forgotten mechanical tools, and pieces of discarded trash. Like they would in the landscape, these components decompose and unite, endowed with life, much like a Gollum.
For centuries, monsters and the natural world have been intertwined, serving as powerful tools for describing and delineating space, marking boundaries, and shaping our understanding of the world. They have long provided a framework for expressing collective ideas about land, ecology, and the unknown. Historically, monsters were depicted on medieval maps as cautionary symbols of the uncharted and untamed world. These illustrations of serpents and other creatures decorated the edges of the territory, incorporating elements of the landscapes they guarded.
Assigning monsters to space holds a place in oral traditions, where storytelling wasn’t merely about inciting fear— it was a means of protection, warning, and asserting control over unknown areas. Similarly, my work uses monsters as metaphors to alert, celebrate, and critique our global and personal relationships with land. These sculptures embody scarcity, limitation, and a longing for ecological balance and renewal.
Modern ecology is intertwined with human intervention, as microplastics infiltrate our environment and pollution fills the air we breathe. As catastrophic as these realities may seem, there is an odd beauty in the integration of human-made elements with the wild. This interplay between the synthetic and the natural informs my work, revealing landscapes not as static, pristine spaces but as dynamic systems shaped by competing forces.
In 55 B.C., the Roman poet Lucretius wrote On the Nature of Things, where he introduced the concept of matter as a dynamic force in flux. This view of the world as a chaotic yet interconnected system resonates deeply with me. I see the landscape as a dance of particles—a continuous flow of energies and forms in constant motion. The combination of synthetic and organic materials in my work reflects this relationship of transformation.
Monsters occupy realms beyond human control, making them potent metaphors for the fragility of ecology and the consequences of exploitation. When a monster appears, it triggers a call to action. Through my work, I seek to understand our interconnectedness with the landscapes we inhabit. Monsters, in all their complexity, offer a lens through which we can explore not only our fears but also our hopes for a more harmonious relationship with the world around us.