Morgan Kemp

A farewell to a Wild Thing:
I’ve been thinking about this goodbye for a long time, giving myself time to reflect on the past five years and what A Wild Thing was for me. For most it was my business name, it’s what I would call coyotes when I saw them in the desert, these spectacles that thrived no matter what oppression came their way. (Fun fact coyotes are the only predator species to not only survive but normally grow in the face of extermination attempts).
I think for me I wanted to be like a coyote, in the season of my life when I started this whole thing I NEEDED to be like a coyote. In the past five years I’ve painted commissions, made apparel and sticker lines, created original work, went to grad school, created a whole gallery show, played with a plethora of mediums and have been lucky enough to sell my work. Grad school sucked a lot of joy out of art for me, the year after graduating I felt lost in my creative work. I felt like I wasn’t a good artist and that everything I made was trivial. But then I somehow got lucky enough to get a job as a furniture maker in a wood shop. For the first time in a long time I was excited about what I was making and where I was headed.
I’ll always have that Wild Thing with me, but each day I feel like I need it a little less. In taking time to reflect on what I want my creative practice to look like, my current business doesn’t feel like it fits. I don’t want to do apparel, I want to make furniture. I don’t want to sling stickers and prints I want to create more original paintings and murals.
And so in order to make room for new growth, A Wild Thing’s Art will be closing its website doors tonight at 8PM. It’s a bittersweet feeling, to close something I’ve worked on for five years, but I’m realizing it was never meant to be my forever, it was one chapter in the insane book of Morgan.
Thank you to everyone who has ever supported my business over the years, thank you for your encouragement, your input, and being along for the journey, you all mean so much to me, and I hope to see you in what’s to come.
Farewell, A Wild Thing’s Art, we had a beautiful run.

Season 6 of “I Love Rafting” featuring episodes like:
“Big Boat Smash”
“Tube Town”
“Dude Where’s My Paddle”
“Where’d All the Water Go”
“The One Where Everyone Gets Hailed On”

All my love to the river and people who hold so much space in my heart🩵

Mentally I’m here🪸🌊
📸: the queen of capturing memories, moments, and all the light filled feels

I think back to this moment a lot. The Galapagos sharks we were swimming with disappeared. The water felt heavy with anticipation, something big was coming. We waited and in the corner of my eye, I saw her. She moved with a calm power, circling the group and getting so close underneath, and I that we had to put our knees to our chest so our fins wouldn’t touch her. When I looked in her eyes, I did not see a man eating monster. I saw something ancient. There was a millennia of ocean wisdom in those eyes. Time felt like it stood still as she gracefully moved through the water, and I’ll forever be grateful for that memory.
So when people ask me, why sharks? I think of her. I think of how beautiful and regal she was, and I also think of all that she is up against. Over 100 million sharks are killed each year, that’s 11,000 per hour. Many are killed for just their fins, or as a result of bycatch from fishing or tangled in nets lost at sea or killed for their livers to make beauty products. Today more than ever sharks need us to be their voice, so sign petitions to ban shark finning and fishing, be selective on your seafood consumption, boycott makeup and products that have squalene in it. And tell all your friends that there’s more to sharks than just Jaws, over 500 species more to be exact🦈
PC: my ocean queen

I love shark week because it brings lots of conversations up about sharks, but as far as the actual Discovery shark week I got mad beef with it. I was really hopeful after seeing how good of a job Netflix did with their two shows Shark Whisperer and All the Sharks (if you haven’t watched you should) but taking a peak at what’s been coming out so far it’s still the big scary Jaws portrayal that earns views not empathy.
Part of my thesis research was on the marketing psychology and impact of visual art and media. For example, the reaction someone has towards bear hunting vs. shark hunting is drastically different. But no wonder, one is a teddy bear, a sweet Winnie the Pooh, the other is a sharknado, man eating Jaws, chomp chomp chomp!
What changed my mentality towards sharks was the positive imagery I began to find thanks to people like .kayleigh and . Once I realized that the media info I was fed was not the whole picture I was able to see the full spectrum and value of sharks. I always hope to do the same in my work, so here’s two of my past pieces I love, a leopard shark on cement and oceanic white tips on a wooden surfboard. There’s so much more to sharks than great whites, and I hope this week you go past Jaws and find a new perspective🦈
Photos by the ever talented and wonderful human

One small step stool for Morgan, one giant leap into furniture making🪚
I had really big ideas of what my first furniture piece would be. There were a lot of things I wanted to make, but only one thing I needed to make: a stool.
After my first day in the wood shop mostly on my tippy toes having a step stool became priority number 1 for ya short girl.
There’s a little dado joint for a shelf to house my work pouch at the end of the day, and a support bar joined with a dowel underneath. Made from white oak and polished with osmo oil in raw my little stool has been the perfect addition to how I move and work in the shop.

Mentally I’m here, falling in love with a tiger shark swimming in and out of the ocean blue. I’ve got my gal pals and in the water with me. Emily and I are probably running into each other while Anna Claire is a perfect ocean queen. Life is good.

LOL: lots of love | black and white edition

📸:

I’ve been waiting 12 years for this: TWENTY NINE🤘🏼🍾

📸:

Today’s the day! 5PM MST you can get your hands on the Western Seas Collection🌊🐴 I’ve been so grateful for everyone’s encouragement and feedback about this series, it means the world that others like the things that come from my brain and my hands.
Don’t forget to signup for my newsletter to get early access on everything starting at 4:30PM MST

What do you have your heart set on?

All of my Western Seas designs will be available in print and canvas options as well as Myrtle and some old favorites of mine! For this go around I’ll be using a print on demand service which gives you the freedom to choose a variety of sizes while keeping waste down on my end. I’m so stoked to see these in your homes, what print is your favorite and where would you put it?🌊🐴

Everything goes live tomorrow at 5PM MST, tell yer friends!