In the 1990s, Morley revisited the maritime themes that had marked his early career, now interwoven with fighter planes that he painstakingly crafted from paper, painted in watercolor, and affixed to the canvas. This integration of sculptural elements, which he described as a “three-dimensional plane,” underscored his ongoing exploration of the boundaries between representation and physical space.

Rather than merely replicating past motifs, Morley reimagined them through the lens of memory and abstraction, using painted models as both subjects and conceptual anchors. Rejecting the idea of these objects as mere “toys,” he instead recognized them as conduits of cultural and psychological significance: “There is an unconsciousness in society that comes out in its toys. Toys represent an archetype of the human figure.” In transforming these everyday forms into painterly constructions, Morley bridged the personal and the universal, revealing the latent narratives embedded within objects of play, war, and spectacle.