Mike Murdock: CLC Artisan

Local performers, artisans, DIY engineers, chefs and crafty innovators come together for the 10th Annual Craft Lake City DIY Festival at the Gallivan Center. This-three day weekend, Aug. 10–12, will encapsulate the craftsmanship that our city cultivates while celebrating Utah’s movers and shakers. Spread across the breadth of these pages are peeks into some of what this year’s DIY Festival will feature. Bring your family, friends, lovers to enjoy what this year’s festival has to offer! Visit craftlakecity.com to learn more about this community enriching event!

Expect bedraggled teeth, walking eyeballs, dancing skulls and other fun and fantastical oddities from the depths of Mike Murdock’s (ultrasnazzy.bigcartel.com) brain. “I’m pretty sure that if I didn’t have some form of a creative outlet in my life, my brain would explode and leave a pile of colorful goo on the carpet, so in that sense art is a bit therapeutic,” says Murdock. “I also just have this strong and weird desire to make stuff. Even if no one ever wanted to buy anything I had made ever again, I’d still just have to do it for some kind of personal gratification.” Luckily, Murdock’s quirky, colorful art—paintings, books, doodles, murals, T-shirts and anything else Murdock feels like working on in the moment—attracts customers who are attracted to his high-voltage, self-deprecating style.

Murdock’s a dad now, so his creative process also functions as an act of escape. “[I’m] usually sneaking out to my garage with candy and beer after I’ve put my girls to bed to listen to music and make a mess,” he says. “I usually try to wear socks, though—there’s spiders out there, you know.” But his kids provide inspiration, too. “I love watching my girls draw or paint stuff and hear them talk about it. It’s super inspiring to see how their little gears turn. A lot of ideas I get come from interacting and adventuring with my crew.” Other sources of inspiration include skateboarding, nature, life, death, corndogs, magic, outer space … “you know, the good stuff.” (Murdock notes, “I don’t really eat hot dogs, though. I just think they’re weird and funny.”)

Into the weird and funny? Check out Murdock’s booth at the DIY Fest for laugh and a smile, and maybe take something home to hang up—where Murdock hopes you “can walk past it on a daily basis and derive some stokage from it.”