Gina Phillips

Gina Phillips comes from Madison County, Kentucky…where the Appalachians soften into rolling hills. Born in 1971, she lived in the same small house with her mother, grandparents and numerous uncles until she was 18. Living conditions harked back to the turn of the century. Water was drawn from a cistern and heated on a coal burning stove; baths were taken from buckets. Although her childhood was marked by an absence of conventional modern conveniences, she was fortunate to be surrounded by a family characterized by a propensity for mechanical, artistic and musical abilities. Her grandfather ran a garage on their property, her grandmother sang and played guitar and her mother painted. Also, she had at her disposal, a whole acre of her own family’s junkyard. She learned that no object or material should be thrown away since it could be reused or turned into something else...something functional or something artistic. She spent many summers with her cousins creating their own elaborate environments out of these accumulations. This environment was perfect training for a life as an artist. Throughout high school, she denied herself art classes and channeled her creativity into a drafting program at the vocational school. She wanted to be an architect, thinking such a profession would allow for creative expression and a practical way out of the poverty in which she had been raised. When she was 18, Phillips moved to Lexington, Kentucky to attend the University of Kentucky and to pursue architectural training. Here she was finally able to take art classes and she soon changed her mind about architecture and focused on art studio. She graduated from UK with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in painting in 1994. During these years, Phillips developed into a mixed-media artist who crafted raw, narrative images. She painted and collaged her tragic/comic narratives onto rather large constructions built from a variety of materials culled from her childhood home such as wood, metal and fabric. One year later, Phillips moved to New Orleans, Louisiana to pursue a Master of Fine Arts degree at Tulane University. She earned her M.F.A. in the spring of 1997. Phillips work continued to be characterized by a raw, narrative quality. However, the bulk of her materials became minimized. She began to focus on fabric as a medium. First, she made paintings on printed fabrics in which her own painted imagery mingled with the imagery of the printed fabric she used as a substructure. Then she began making pieces solely out of fabric and thread. Phillips’ work often treads a fine line between three dimensional and two dimensional work. In many ways it functions as painting does, there is the illusion of light and space…but the pieces maintain their “objecthood”. Many of her “quilts” are two-sided and she often avoids framing pieces so that there may be easy access to their backsides. Phillips has lived in New Orleans for ten years. She has an affinity for this city and feels that it provides a good artistic community and enough commercial opportunities. She also appreciates New Orleans’ rustic qualities and its quirky personalities. Phillips bought a house in the lower ninth ward neighborhood of New Orleans in the summer of 2004. Phillips spent a year repairing this single shotgun, turning half of it into studio space. One week after finishing the project, her house was seriously damaged by Hurricane Katrina. For 10 months she lived in Richmond, VA while she waited for a FEMA trailer to be installed in her backyard. She lived in the FEMA trailer for a year and a half and is now living in her house ....finally. I edited my profile with Thomas' Myspace Editor V4.4