Zora J. Murff

Zora J Murff
Born1987 (age 38–39)
Des Moines, Iowa, U.S.
Education
Websitewww.zora-murff.com

Zora J Murff (born 1987)[1][2] is an American artist, curator, and educator.[3][4] As of 2026, he is based in Eugene, Oregon and teaches photography at the University of Oregon's School of Art + Design.[5] Murff uses his creative practice to emphasize visual culture's entanglements with race, capitalism, and other forms of hierarchical oppression. Murff studied and has practiced photography expansively including collage and assemblage, but he also works with sculpture, installation, text works, and sound.[6][7] Murff has also taught photography at the University of Arkansas' School of Art,[8] the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University.[9]

Life and work

Murff was born in 1987 in Des Moines, Iowa,[10] to an African-American working class family. He studied for a BS in psychology from Iowa State University.[11]

Following his graduation in 2010, took a job as a Tracker for Linn County Juvenile Detention and Diversion Services in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Murff enrolled at the University of Iowa to study photography at the same time. He photographed the children that he worked with, which resulted in Corrections, his final-year BA project, "about a system that too often fails the disenfranchised youth to whom it has a duty of care".[4] The Corrections photo series images were taken from 2013 to 2015. "about a system that too often fails the disenfranchised youth to whom it has a duty of care".[4] The Corrections photo series images were taken from 2013 to 2015, and explores a "contradictory relationship that Murff acknowledges [...], between his effort to build trust with the young people and his position as a tracker to make sure they followed court orders, while securing their willingness to be photographed."[12][13] He published the work as a monograph in 2015 with Aint-Bad Magazine.[14] Murff has continued to create work about incarceration in America.[15][16][17]

After concluding his studies at the University of Iowa, Murff enrolled in the MFA studio art program at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.[18][11] In April 2018, he launched his thesis exhibition Re-Making the Mark,[19] a mixture of photography and sculpture focused on the historical impacts of redlining in North Omaha, a Historically African-American neighborhood in Omaha, Nebraska. His second monograph Lost: Omaha, includes some work from Re-Making the Mark. His later monograph, At No Point In Between also includes work originally contained within his series Lost: Omaha. At No Point In Between won the Independent category of the 2019 Lucie Foundation Photobook Prize.[20][21] In 2020, Murff won the Next Step Award, a collaborative award between Aperture Foundation, 7|G Foundation, and the Baxter Street Camera Club of New York, meant, "...to identify strong emerging or evolving voices whose work deserves greater recognition."[22] As a part of the award, Murff published his fourth monograph, True Colors (or, Affirmations in a Crisis) with Aperture Foundation. The publication is a survey of the artist's practice and visual culture and includes multiple contributions from other artists and writers.[23] Murff's debut museum solo exhibition, RACE/HUSTLE, opened at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in 2025. The exhibition was curated by Terence Washington and examines, "...physical, psychic, and political violence, the rhythms and resonances of oppression throughout history and into the present, and the harmful desires that our visual culture cultivates."[24][25]

Murff taught Photography at the University of Arkansas School of Art from 2018–2023 and at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University from 2023–2025. In 2025, he joined the faculty at the University of Oregon. He was also a co-curator of Strange Fire Artist Collective (formed in 2015) with artists Jess T. Dugan and Rafael Soldi, and curator Hamidah Glasgow and departed the collective in 2020.[26] In 2019, he was an artist-in-resident at Light Work in Syracuse, NY.[27] In 2024, Murff was an artist-in-residence at the Center for Photography at Woodstock.[28] In 2023, Murff was awarded the Documentary Practice and Visual Journalism Infinity Award from the International Center of Photography.[29][30][31]

Publications of Individual Work

  • Corrections. Savanna, GA: Aint-Bad, 2015. ISBN 978-1-944005-01-6. Edition of 450 copies. With a foreword by Pete Brook.[14]
  • Lost: Omaha. Brooklyn, NY: Kris Graves, 2018. One volume in a collection of 10. With an essay by Lisa Riordan Seville.[32] OCLC 1035555819. First edition, 125 copies. First edition (second printing), 100 copies.[33]
  • At No Point In Between. Dais, 2019. ISBN 978-1-7339499-1-0. With an essay by Terence Washington and an afterword by Lisa Riordan Seville. Edition of 155 copies.
  • True Colors (or, Affirmations in a Crisis). Brooklyn, NY: Aperture, 2022. ISBN 978-1-59711-517-9. First edition.[34]

Publication as Author

  • Murff, Young, et. al., Take It From Here. Columbia, MO: There, There Now, 2020. Edition of 200.[35]
  • Murff, "Pastoral Counterinsurgency: Review of Tyler Mitchell's 'Ghost Images' at Gagosian Gallery," DEAR DAVE, Magazine, 2025.[36]
  • Murff, "The Education of Harlan Bozeman" DEAR DAVE, Magazine, Issue No. 37, 2024.[37]
  • Murff, Bengal, and Leonard, "LaToya Ruby Frazier's Steady Gaze," Magazine, MoMA, 2024.[38]

Exhibitions as Artist

Solo Exhibitions

  • RACE/HUSTLE, MASS MoCA, North Adams, Massachusetts, 2025[39]
  • The Devil Hiding in Plain Sight, Roger Glass Center for the Arts, University of Dayton, Dayton, Ohio, 2024[40]
  • We Here for Some Jive Conspiracy, Webber Gallery, Los Angeles, California, 2023[41]
  • At No Point In Between, West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia, 2022[42]
  • American Mother, American Father, Belfast Photo Festival, Belfast, Ireland, 2022[43]
  • Bold As Brass (or, Third Year Review), Baxter Street Camera Club of New York, New York, New York, 2021[44]
  • At No Point In Between, Webber Gallery, London, United Kingdom, 2021[45]
  • Re-Making the Mark, Gregory Allicar Museum, Fort Collins, Colorado, 2019[46]
  • Corrections, Center for Fine Art Photography, Fort Collins, Colorado, 2016[47]
  • Corrections, Filter Space, Chicago, Illinois, 2016[48]

Two & Three Person Exhibitions

  • Fade Like a Sigh: Zora J Murff & Rana Young, Greenwood Community College, Greenwood, Massachusetts, 2024[49]
  • Fade Like a Sigh: Zora J Murff & Rana Young, Spellerberg Projects, Lockheart, Texas, 2021[50]
  • Talking Back: Zora J Murff & Rana Young, Brick City Galleries, Missouri State University, Springfield, Missouri, 2020[51]
  • Fade Like a Sigh: Zora J Murff & Rana Young, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, Nebraska, City, Nebraska, 2017[52]

Group Exhibitions

  • Truth Told Slant, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia, 2024[53]
  • A Long Arc: Photography and the American South since 1845, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia, 2023[54]
  • Intimate Strangers, Yancey Richardson Gallery, New York, New York, 2023[55]
  • LagosPhoto2023, African Artists Foundation, Lagos, Nigeria, 2023[56]
  • America in Crisis, Saatchi Gallery, London, United Kingdom, 2022[57]
  • Prison Nation, Davis Museum, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts, 2022[58]
  • Family Album, LACMA, Los Angeles, California, 2022[59]
  • American Epidemic: Guns in the United States, Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, Illinois, 2021[60]
  • At No Point In Between, Louis Roederer Award Exhibition, Rencontres d'Arles, Arles, France, 2021[61]
  • Companion Pieces: New Photography 2020, MoMA, New York, New York, 2020[62]

Exhibitions as Curator/Co-Curator

  • A Terrible Beauty: Hannah Altman, Eduardo L Rivera & Rana Young, Well Gallery, SMFA at Tufts University, Boston, Massachusetts, 2024, Co-Curators: Andrew J. Bailey, Yuxuan Cai, William C. Casey, Niko Krivanek, Amy Ma, Nicol Mai, Barkat Mehra, Justin Musyimi, Matilda Peng, Karen M. Salam[63]
  • Take It From Here, Abakus Projects, Boston, Massachusetts, 2024, Co-Curator: Rana Young[64]
  • 2023 VCP Open Juried Exhibition, Vermont Center for Photography, Brattleboro, Vermont, 2023[65]
  • Points of Departure, Visible Records, Charlottesville, Virginia, 2022, Co-Curators: Jay Simple, Sydney Ellison, and Ally Caple[66]
  • Collective Interventions: On Past, Present and Future Topographics, Fine Arts Gallery, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas, 2021, Co-Curators: Charles Krampah (MFA 2022), Kalyn Barnoski (MFA 2021), Miki Skak (MFA 2023), Sky Maggiore (MFA 2023), Tay Butler (MFA 2022)[67]

Collections

  • Victoria & Albert Museum[68]
  • National Gallery of Art[69]
  • Studio Museum in Harlem[70]
  • San Francisco Museum of Modern Art[71]
  • Denver Museum of Art[72]
  • Los Angeles County Museum of Art
  • Museum of Contemporary Photography[73]

References

  1. ↑ "2019 Portfolio Prize Runner-Up: Zora J Murff". Aperture. April 19, 2019. Retrieved November 29, 2021.
  2. ↑ Paul, Cassidy (October 30, 2020). "Announcing Zora J Murff as the Recipient of the Inaugural Next Step Award". Aperture. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  3. ↑ "Photos of Teenagers' Lives in Limbo Between Incarceration and Freedom". Vice. October 6, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  4. 1 2 3 "Kid criminals: tagged, tracked and cast off by society". British Journal of Photography. June 24, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  5. ↑ "Zora Murff | School of Art + Design". artdesign.uoregon.edu. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  6. ↑ Warren, Serena (May 2, 2025). "Zora J Murff RACE/HUSTLE". MASS MoCA. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  7. ↑ "RACE/HUSTLE". artguide.artforum.com. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  8. ↑ "School of Art Assistant Professor Zora J Murff Named Emerging Scholar". University of Arkansas News. January 21, 2021. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  9. ↑ "Meet the New Full-Time Faculty Joining SMFA in Fall 2023". School of the Museum of Fine Arts. Tufts University. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  10. ↑ "Aux Rencontres d'Arles, quatre jeunes photographes dans la lumière". Le Monde.fr (in French). July 5, 2021. Retrieved November 29, 2021.
  11. 1 2 Drew, Kimberly; Wortham, Jenna (October 26, 2021). Black Futures. Random House Publishing Group. p. 517. ISBN 978-0-399-18115-3.
  12. ↑ "New York Galleries: What to See Right Now". The New York Times. October 9, 2019. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved November 29, 2021.
  13. ↑ Fleetwood, Nicole (2020). Captured by the Frame: Photographic Studies of Prisoners. In Marking Time: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration. Harvard University Press. pp. 87–117. ISBN 9780674919228. JSTOR j.ctv11vcfjs.9.
  14. 1 2 "Zora J. Murff : Corrections". AINT—BAD. May 6, 2016. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  15. ↑ Murff, Zora J. (April 20, 2017). "The women who ride for hours to visit loved ones in prison – in pictures". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  16. ↑ "How One Woman's Fight to Save Her Family Helped Lead to a Mass Exoneration". The New Yorker. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  17. ↑ "The Corrections: a rare look at America's convicted teens – in pictures". The Guardian. September 10, 2015. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved June 18, 2021.
  18. ↑ "Zora Murff: States Project: Iowa". LENSCRATCH. October 3, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  19. ↑ Zora, Murff (2018). "Re-Making The Mark". DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln.
  20. ↑ "FOCUS ON Zora J Murff". Photograph Mag. November 10, 2020. Retrieved February 21, 2023.
  21. ↑ "At No Point In Between - Zora J. Murff". Dais Books. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  22. ↑ Paul, Cassidy (October 30, 2020). "Announcing Zora J Murff as the Recipient of the Inaugural Next Step Award". Aperture. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  23. ↑ "Zora J Murff: True Colors (or, Affirmations in a Crisis)". Aperture. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  24. ↑ Warren, Serena (May 2, 2025). "Zora J Murff RACE/HUSTLE | MASS MoCA". Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  25. ↑ "A&A Graduate Student Curates at Mass MoCA | Department of Art and Archaeology". artandarchaeology.princeton.edu. Retrieved March 15, 2026.
  26. ↑ "About". Strange Fire. Archived from the original on October 22, 2018. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  27. ↑ "Announcing the 2019 Light Work Artists-in-Residence". Light Work (Press release). September 13, 2018. Retrieved December 30, 2021.
  28. ↑ "CPW 2024 Woodstock AIRs". Center for Photography at Woodstock. 2024. Retrieved March 1, 2026.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  29. ↑ "Aperture announces Zora J Murff as the recipient of the inaugural Next Step Award". artdaily.com. October 31, 2020. Retrieved November 29, 2021.
  30. ↑ "Announcing Zora J Murff as the Recipient of the Inaugural Next Step Award". Aperture. October 30, 2020. Retrieved November 29, 2021.
  31. ↑ "ICP Infinity Awards to Honor Ming Smith, Joyce Cowin, Ariella Aïsha Azoulay, Poulomi Basu, and Zora J Murff". International Center of Photography (Press release). January 9, 2023. Retrieved February 21, 2023.
  32. ↑ "SOLDOUT". + KGP. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  33. ↑ "LOST, Omaha SHIPPED". The Union for Contemporary Art. Retrieved September 17, 2018.
  34. ↑ "Zora J. Murff True Colors: (or, Affirmations in a Crisis)". Aperture. Retrieved February 21, 2023.
  35. ↑ "take it from here". www.theretherenow.com. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  36. ↑ "DEAR DAVE Magazine". DEAR DAVE Magazine. April 10, 2025. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  37. ↑ "Subscribe to Dear Dave Issues, Interviews, Video, Looking at Photography". DEAR DAVE Magazine. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  38. ↑ "LaToya Ruby Frazier's Steady Gaze | Magazine | MoMA". The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  39. ↑ Warren, Serena (May 2, 2025). "Zora J Murff RACE/HUSTLE | MASS MoCA". Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  40. ↑ "The Devil Hiding in Plain Sight | FotoFocus Cincinnati". Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  41. ↑ "Zora J Murff: We Here For Some... | Exhibitions | MutualArt". www.mutualart.com. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  42. ↑ "Mesaros Exhibition: Zora J. Murff: At No Point In Between (Photography)". West Virginia University. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  43. ↑ Williams, Megan (June 24, 2022). "Zora J Murff's series asks how much we control our own image". Creative Review. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  44. ↑ "Bold As Brass (or, Third Year Review) | Baxter St at CCNY". www.baxterst.org. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  45. ↑ "At No Point In Between | Exhibitions". Webber. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  46. ↑ "Re-Making the Mark - Gregory Allicar Museum of Art | Colorado State University". artmuseum.colostate.edu. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  47. ↑ "Corrections | Zora Murff". Center for Fine Art Photography. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  48. ↑ "Corrections". Filter Photo. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  49. ↑ "Fade Like a Sigh: Zora Murff & Rana Young". Art Department. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  50. ↑ "Zora J Murff and Rana Young, "Fade Like a Sigh" | Photography exhibition in Lockhart Texas". Spellerberg Projects. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  51. ↑ Griffiths, Katherine (February 16, 2020). "The Collaborative Work of Zora J Murff & Rana Young". Art + Design Blog. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  52. ↑ "Fade Like Sigh | Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, Nebraska City". www.khncenterforthearts.org. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  53. ↑ "Truth Told Slant: Contemporary Photography". High Museum of Art. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  54. ↑ "A Long Arc: Photography and the American South since 1845". High Museum of Art. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  55. ↑ "Intimate Strangers - - Exhibitions - Yancey Richardson". www.yanceyrichardson.com. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  56. ↑ Column, Africans (October 9, 2023). "14th LagosPhoto Festival Announces Places, Artist List, and Theme". Africans Column. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  57. ↑ Embling, Damon (January 23, 2022). "'My Black American experience': Saatchi Gallery exhibition highlights equality struggle". Euronews. Retrieved March 1, 2026.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  58. ↑ "Prison Nation, Davis Museum, Wellesley College". Aperture. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  59. ↑ "Family Album: Dannielle Bowman, Janna Ireland and Contemporary Works from LACMA | LACMA". www.lacma.org. January 13, 2022. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  60. ↑ "American Epidemic: Guns in the United States – MoCP". www.mocp.org. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  61. ↑ d'Arles, Les Rencontres. "ZORA J MURFF". www.rencontres-arles.com. Archived from the original on June 23, 2024. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  62. ↑ "Companion Pieces: New Photography 2020 | MoMA". The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  63. ↑ "A Terrible Beauty". ZORA J MURFF. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  64. ↑ "Take it From Here | Fine Art Photography Gallery in Boston". Abakus Projects. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  65. ↑ vcphoto1998 (March 8, 2023). "2023 Open Juried Exhibition | Vermont Center for Photography". Retrieved March 1, 2026.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  66. ↑ "Photographer's Green Book". VISIBLE / RECORDS. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  67. ↑ "Past Exhibitions". Fine Arts Center Gallery. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  68. ↑ Museum, Victoria and Albert. "Search Results | V&A Explore the Collections". Victoria and Albert Museum. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  69. ↑ "Search artworks | National Gallery of Art". www.nga.gov. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  70. ↑ "The Studio Museum in Harlem Permanent Collection". Studio Museum in Harlem. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  71. ↑ "Murff, Zora J". SFMOMA. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  72. ↑ "Search the Collections". Denver Art Museum. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
  73. ↑ "Zora J Murff". mocp.emuseum.com. Retrieved March 1, 2026.
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