In 1959, Murphy became a teacher at the Slade School of Art and in 1960, senior lecturer at Chelsea College of Arts,[REF] where he remained until 1974 [REF].
In 1974,[REF] he won the John Moores Painting Prize for Figure with Yellow Foreground which the Tate Gallery describes as showing "a sophisticated balance of observed detail and abstract, flat planes of colour."[REF]