Maggie Taylor’s imaginative and surreal images are created by utilizing a variety of imagery. She collects and “recycles” daguerreotype or tintype portraits of unknown subjects from the 19th century. Taylor then builds stories around her subjects by combining her own photographs along with scanned objects to create digital collages in Photoshop; using as many as 200 layers. More recently, she has experimented with using AI technology to source her imagery. After earning a degree in philosophy from Yale University and a master’s degree in photography from the University of Florida, she began exploring digital imaging in the 1990s, when the medium was still new. She was among the first artists to adopt Photoshop as a fine art tool, drawn to its potential for layered digital photomontage.

Her images are humorous, whimsical and reminiscent of Magritte or Dali and explore deeper archetypes, perhaps referencing her philosophy degree from Yale University. Her work has been widely exhibited and is held in numerous museum collections, including The Center for Creative Photography, Tucson; George Eastman Museum, Rochester; Harn Museum of Art, Gainesville; Harry Ransom Center, The University of Texas; The High Museum of Art, Atlanta; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Ogden Museum of Southern Art, New Orleans; Princeton University Art Museum; Harvard Art Museums; The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art; The Cleveland Museum of Art; and The Santa Barbara Museum of Art.