Mixing it up
Tim Phillips, assistant director of facilities at the Reily Center on the uptown campus, shows a handful of his mixed-media art pieces. (Photo by Sally Asher)
New Orleans native Tim Phillips finds resilience, recycling and rebuilding as themes in his life and his art. Phillips, the assistant director of facilities at the Reily Student Recreation Center at Tulane University, has lived in various places around the country and has held diverse jobs: trumpet player, graphic designer for the commercial art industry and artist. With all of these changes over the years, Phillips"s art has remained a constant.
Phillips has exhibited his mixed-media art and paintings in galleries all over the country and he has created a myriad of large-format murals for the Mercedes Benz Superdome, the Hyatt Hotel and Ochsner Hospital.
“I got profoundly intrigued by texture, stain, degradation, weathering, aging, erosion -- things that were worn and broken in and, in some cases, completely transformed.” -- Tim Phillips
For his mixed media pieces, Phillips is drawn to natural pigments like coffee, red wine, wasabi anything that stains. He also incorporates found objects, or as he puts it, “what others might consider trash,” into his work.
“When I was first exploring and discovering my voice as an artist,” Phillips says, “I got profoundly intrigued by texture, stain, degradation, weathering, aging, erosion things that were worn and broken in and, in some cases, completely transformed from their original design. I once incorporated a piece of lathe I"d found in the street that had been folded and crushed by being rolled over by who knows how many vehicles. The effect was very satisfying.”
Phillips, who recently started working in metal, particularly copper and aluminum, has always had an affinity for fish and uses them and water frequently as subject matter for compositional experimentation. They"ve proven so popular that many of his fish-themed works are in seafood restaurants along the Gulf Coast and the East Coast as well as in private collections.
Like Louisiana culture, Phillips"s work reflects a resilience, beauty and diversity unique to the elements and spirit that create it.
