"In my view, it is the domain of the artist to challenge and to excite. Haven't you met persons similar to the images these watercolors conjure up? I want you to admire their beauty and delight in the paintings. I choose colors for their sensuousness, forms for their expressiveness and textures for their sumptuousness." - Morris Taylor

Morris Taylor paints watercolors ranging from exquisite nature portaits to brillant abstractions. There is a fluid connection between his artistic visions and the outward glow of his paintings. The Gallery of work included in this website demonstrate the artist's skill and interest in flowers, fly fisherman, fruit and more.

Previous one-person shows in the San Francisco Bay Area include Grace Cathedral, Magnet in the Castro, and the St. Frances Foundation. Dr. Taylor has also exhibited in national conferences, San Francisco Open Studios and the City Art Gallery.

I was first drawn to glass because of its inherent interplay with light and transparency, a liquid masquerading as a solid. Glass has its own personality: it is fragile in its material composition, yet incredibly strong-willed in its behavior. Playing with this dual nature, I like to see how far I can manipulate the medium while acquiescing to its stubborn side. 

 I make metaphoric and utilitarian vessels in clay to explore beauty as a human nutrient. The vessels arrayed in delicate scaffolding, secured to a wall, nested on industrial felt or held in someone’s hand, bridge theoretical notions of art, craft and design. I offer these vessels in precarious arrangements, intimate settings and community spaces to create sensate and spatial fields for embodied viewing. Ultimately hoping to intonate a range of psychic relations.

My work investigates verbal and non-verbal differences I observe as resonant or dissonant interactions between individuals or in community. I aim to initiate a kinesthetic retuning of mind and body alignment through activation of space and the viewer’s body.

As a crafts person, my hands guide an intuitive awareness of interactions into the material realm. The utilitarian or metaphoric vessels lend these observations physical form. For example, Geo Political Array, arrangement of porcelain catchments teetering on masonry line structurally suggests, by turns, safety or peril.  Orogenic Spires, ceramic edifices that at once suggest beauty and fragility metaphorically activate a sense of land formation and wind currents to heighten awareness of invisible forces. Objects and spatial installations made to invite intimacy.

I choose clay for its properties of flexibility, forgiveness and my inability to control outcomes. I use porcelain, primal clay that is mined where it was formed and sedimentary clay that has been transported to new places by water. 

I attended Pratt Institute as a recipient of the “Raw Talent Scholarship.” After graduating, I was recruited by Ralph Lauren to illustrate Ralph Lauren’s fashion concepts in photo realistic color pencil drawings. When I left Ralph Lauren at the age of 25, I was as the youngest director in company history. 

After Ralph Lauren, I started a brand identity and package design company. I led a team that designed brand identities, packaging, and print communications for companies that include; Estée Lauder, Elizabeth Arden, Christian Dior, Fendi, Liz Claiborne, Coach, Cosmair, Revlon, Perry Ellis, Clarins, and Stuart Weitzman. My work took me all over the world. I’ve created brand identities and package design for companies and sports teams in South Korea, Australia, Monaco, Switzerland, China and Canada. I also designed athlete brand identities for Tiger Woods and former heavyweight champions Evander Holyfield and Jon Ruiz. 

In 2004 I relocated to San Francisco to become the creative director for a major online travel website. It didn’t take long for me to fall in love with the city. When I’m not working as a professional creative, I can be found working in my San Francisco Mission district art studio or in various city parks drawing pen and ink illustrations. 

As a fine artist, I am multi-disciplined and enjoy working in a variety of mediums. I tend to be representational in my work but can move from photo-realism to abstract comfortably. I enjoy creating pieces that use bold strong colors combined with high-detail. I like unusual subject matters and enjoy combining unlikely elements into my pieces. For instance, combining my pen and ink illustrations with antique maps. My fashion background continues to be a theme in my work, inspiring me to explore functional and wearable art, as well as illustrations to adorn and enhance walls. 

As I evolve and add the pages of life,I find myself again igniting my passion for art. My aim is to capture the beautiful essence of the human body.
My pieces are of clay ,a very easy and pliable material with the ability to add and subtract and carve and shape. I leave the raw texture in most of my pieces to show the material. I see,I sculpt, I push the clay,fast and slow , dancing with the energy of my model and myself. The body is a beautiful element. I try to capture the spirit,the emotion,the gesture,the positive and the negative in which the body creates within the space.
BA California of the Arts