Field Notes: Learning to See

Field Notes: Learning to See is a collaborative exhibition by sculptor Yvonne Murphy Love and painter Deirdre Murphy, inspired by more than fifty years of daily naturalist field notes kept by Love’s parents, Naomi and Bill Murphy—devoted birders and lifelong observers of the natural world. Rooted in a shared inheritance of scientific inquiry from their parents—an oncologist and citizen naturalists—the artists engage in a cross-generational, interdisciplinary dialogue shaped by early experiences of close looking: Love through binoculars scanning skies and marshlands, and Murphy through microscopes examining cellular and microscopic forms. Reimagining bird counts, migration records, and handwritten logs, the exhibition honors both citizen science and professional research while opening poetic reflections on environmental change, continuity, and loss.

This exhibition is dedicated to my father, Dr. Martin Murphy Jr. who taught me to see the seen and unseen in his laboratory.