Delgado Community College invites the public to an exhibition of new works by Gina Phillips, “The Call of the Alluvial Empire,” which will be on view in the Isaac Delgado Fine Art Gallery Sept. 2-30, 2010. 

The Isaac Delgado Fine Art Gallery is located on the third floor of Building One/Isaac Delgado Hall on Delgado’s City Park Campus (615 City Park Avenue in New Orleans, La). The exhibit is free and open to the public.

Additionally, the public is invited to attend a free opening reception for the exhibit on Thursday, Sept. 2, 6 – 8 p.m. in the gallery.

“We all know that New Orleans is an absurd place to live,” said Phillips.  “Naturally, we ask ourselves, ‘Why am I living here?’ Almost in the same breath, we find ourselves exclaiming, ‘I can’t imagine living anywhere else!’ The imagery in this body of work embodies this conundrum.”

“The Call of the Alluvial Empire,” Title piece from Gina Phillips’ Exhibit

Artist’s Statement About the Exhibit 

The situation of our geography is at the heart of our absurd situation. In the show’s title piece, we find two hapless European colonizers hanging out at the very edge of the Delta…this is where it all begins…the very first of our kind coming to grips with the situation. “This land must be claimed?!” They bear the look of those who have come to the conclusion, “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em!”

Salvage Operation blurs the continuity of time. An old-timey deep-sea diver attempts to pick up the pieces at the very bottom of the Mississippi as a modern New Orleans looms in the background. There doesn’t appear to be much worth salvaging. The imagery for this piece was inspired by several sources…one is John M. Barry’s book Rising Tide. His depiction of engineer James Eads’ early attempts to understand and control the river inspired the deep-sea diver.  Another source of inspiration is the story of the Battle of New Orleans. The battleground is just down the road from my house. One little tidbit about the history of the site kept sticking in my mind…at some point there was a movement to properly bury the dead British, but it became apparent that the river had totally carved away the land that contained their mass grave…the land and the bodies were gone. Of course, Katrina’s flood water is also an obvious reference in this piece, even though the river was not the source of the flooding. Ultimately, a goofy pelican triumphs above it all.

My husband Louis’ experience here is also a main theme within this show. He’s the focus of three pieces: Louis Tugs a Tug, Glittering Strand, and The Arrow of Time is a Lie. I like to tell people that I “imported” him when they ask about our history together. He moved here after Katrina…from Virginia, which was recently deemed “the most efficient state in the Union”.  I lived with him in Richmond, VA for 10 months while being displaced after Katrina. He gave up his life in VA and we moved back in 2006. We lived in a FEMA trailer in my backyard and began to rebuild my house in the Lower Ninth Ward. There were times that he expressed outrage and disbelief about the pace of recovery…at the same time, he claimed to enjoy the rare quality of solitude that surrounded this place the summer of ’06 and that he couldn’t imagine living in any other place. It’s been interesting watching him succumb to “The Call of the Alluvial Empire*.

*The Call of the Alluvial Empire was a pamphlet created by the Southern Alluvial Land Association in 1919. Its goal was to attract labor to the Mississippi delta. It’s role as a piece of propaganda serving the interests of Mississippi plantation owners is described in Rising Tide.

About the Artist

Gina Phillips comes from Madison County, Ky. Her childhood was marked by an absence of conventional modern conveniences, but she was fortunate to be surrounded by a family characterized by a propensity for mechanical, artistic and musical abilities. 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.

When she was 18, Phillips moved to Lexington, Ky., to attend the University of Kentucky, from which she graduated in 1994 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in painting. 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.

In 1995, Phillips moved to New Orleans 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 and focused on fabric as a medium. First, her 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. In many ways, this type of work functions as painting does, offering the illusion of light and space but allowing the pieces to maintain their “objecthood.”

Phillips continues to live in New Orleans. She has an affinity for the 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 in the summer of 2004 and 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 ten 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 while she repaired her home a second time. She moved back into her house in October of 2007 and started making art again. Phillips is represented by Jonathan Ferrara Gallery.

Selected One-Person Exhibitions

2006 Southern Tales, Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA

2004 Plucked from Thin Air: Songs and Stories about Suspended Characters, Marguerite Oestreicher Fine Arts, NOLA

2003 Riverfront Galleries, New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts, NOLA

2001 Marguerite Oestreicher Fine Arts, NOLA

1999 New Works, Delgado Community College, NOLA

1999 Pride of Trigg County, Marguerite Oestreicher Fine Arts, NOLA

1997 In Stitches, Carroll Gallery, Tulane University, NOLA

1994 Twister, Barnhart Gallery, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY

1993 Virtual Gallery, Lexington, KY

Selected Group Exhibitions

2010 Prospect 2, New Orleans, LA

2009 Adam and Gina…Not Better, Not Worse, Just Different, Taylor Bercier Fine Arts, New Orleans, LA

2009 All City Art Faculty Exhibition, Universal Furniture Art Space, New Orleans, LA

2009 The Unconventional Portrait, Country Day School, Metairie, LA

2009 Hot Up Here, Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA

2009 Christopher Deris and Gina Phillips, Carroll Gallery, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA

2009 Portraits, Diboll Gallery, Loyola University, New Orleans, LA

2008 Stitch, Antenna, NOLA

2008 Women of New Orleans, Van Brunt Gallery, Beacon, NY

2006 Surviving the Hurricane: Katrina’s Impact on New Orleans Art, Contemporary Arts Center, NOLA

2006 Outside-in, Inside-Out, Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, AL

2003 Inaugural Exhibition, Centre for the Living Arts

Saltline Biennial, Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, AL

2003 The Decline of Western Evolution, Barrister’s Gallery, NOLA

2001 Contemporary Art from the Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation, Pepperdine University, Malibu, CA

2001 2001 New Orleans Triennial, New Orleans Museum of Art, NOLA

2001 Exploring Assemblage in New Orleans, Barrister’s Gallery, NOLA

2000 Under the Influence: Artists Reflect on the 20th Century, Contemporary Arts Center, NOLA

2000 No Dead Artists, Jonathan Ferrara Gallery, NOLA

2000 Modern Primitive Gallery, Atlanta, GA

2000 New Views, Carroll Gallery, Tulane University, NOLA

1998 Recent Works, ArtPlace Gallery, Lexington, KY

1998 The Force of Continuity, Caroll Gallery, Tulane University, NOLA

1997 Louisiana Open, Contemporary Arts Center, NOLA

1995 Steve Armstrong, Gina Phillips: Automata, Mixed-Media Painting, ArtsPlace Gallery, Lexington, KY

Professional Experience

Ogden Museum of Southern Art

2009 Instructor: Introduction to Fiber Arts with Gina Phillips,

Tulane University

1997-2005, Adjunct Instructor: Painting and Drawing

2008, 2009

1995-1997 Adjunct Teaching Assistant: Printmaking, Painting and Drawing

Delgado Community College, New Orleans LA

1995 Adjunct Instructor: Sculpture

Ogden Museum of Southern Art, New Orleans LA

2002-2009 Art Instructor: Artist and Sense of Place Residency

Young Audiences, New Orleans LA

1999-2008 Art Instructor for Summer Camps and After School Programs

Selected Bibliography

Bookhardt, D. Eric. “Just Folks.” (New Orleans) Gambit Weekly, August 28, 2001.

“Up East, Down Home.” (New Orleans) Gambit Weekly, May 18, 2004.

Colpitt, Frances. “Report from New Orleans, Southern Sensibilities.” Art in America, no. 11 (November 2001):59-63.

Dawson, Faith. “A Sew-Sew Form of Art.” New Orleans Magazine (March 2002): 24.

Fagaly, William A. 2001 New Orleans Triennial. New Orleans: New Orleans Museum of Art, 2001.

Haubrich, Kirah. “Gina Phillips: An Artist En Route.” New Orleans Art Review (July/August 1999): 10-11.

MacCash,Doug. “Punk Quilts are Portraits of Threadbare Lives.” (New Orleans) Times-Picayune, October 15, 1999.

“A Gallery of Greats: The Most Lasting Visions of 1999.” (New

Orleans) Times-Picayune, December 31, 1999. –

“Passing the Torch: Young artists fan the flames in interpreting master works.” (New Orleans) Times-Picayune, October 27, 2000.

“Entertaining Art.” (New Orleans) Times-Picayune, April 25, 2001.

“Crafty Artists and Arty Craftsmen There’s Room for All in the Art World.” (New Orleans) Times-Picayune, August 24, 2001.

“Accidental Tribute.” (New Orleans) Times-Picayune, February 14, 2003.

“Plucked from Thin Air.” (New Orleans) Times-Picayune, May 28, 2004.

McLellan, Marian. “Crafty Essays in Humor.” New Orleans Art Review XIX, no. 1 (September /October, 2001): 28-29. .

McCree, Cree. “Astro Art—Gina Phillips Has the ‘Right Stuff’ for NASA.” Southern Woman (March 2003).

Collections

University of Kentucky, Lexington

*NASA

New Orleans Museum of Art

Ogden Museum of Southern Art, New Orleans

Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation, Los Angeles

Tulane University, New Orleans

*The piece commissioned by NASA, titled Spacesuit, was destroyed in Hurricane Katrina.

Education

1997 MFA, Painting Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana

1994 BFA, Painting University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky

The Isaac Delgado Gallery is open 9 a.m. - 4 p.m., Monday - Friday. For more information, contact Brenda Hanegan at 504-671-6377 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              504-671-6377      end_of_the_skype_highlighting or bhaneg@dcc.edu.