Gina Phillips

Fats Went Fishing With the Natives

2025

Gina Phillips is a mixed media, narrative artist who grew up in Kentucky and has lived in New Orleans since 1995. The imagery, stories and characters of both regions influence her work. She started her career as a painter, but over the years, has increasingly incorporated fabric and thread into her work. She begins a piece with a simple under-painting in acrylic paint on canvas or muslin, then finishes the piece by appliquéing fabric and thread on top. Phillips uses a communal gathering process to source her fabrics, as neighbors, friends, the family often donate to her artistic process. Phillip’s work is characterized by a raw, narrative quality. The people and animals telling the story often embody a magical realism. Gina Phillips has a BFA from the University of Kentucky and an MFA from Newcomb–Tulane College – Tulane University. Her work has been exhibited in galleries and museums across the country including Pepperdine University, Ballroom Marfa, Ogden Museum of Southern Art, the 21c Museum Hotel in Louisville – MGallery, KY, the 21c Museum Hotel in Bentonville, AR and Mason-Scharfenstein Museum of Art at Piedmont College in Demorest, GA. Also, her work has been presented at numerous art fairs including PULSE LA, PULSE Miami, Texas Contemporary, VOLTA Basel, Miami Project for Art Basel Miami Beach, Seattle Art Fair and Art Market San Francisco. Phillips’ work has been featured in Art in America, Oxford American, The Times-Picayune/ The New Orleans Advocate and ARTNews, among others. She was selected as one of 27 international artists featured in the Prospect.2 Biennial of Contemporary Art curated by Dan Cameron and her collection of fabric portraits was exhibited as a solo project at VOLTA8 as part of Art Basel in Basel, Switzerland. In 2014, Phillips' work was featured in a mid-career retrospective at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans, LA and the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, AR in a group exhibition of 102 artists from across the country, entitled, “State of the Art: Discovering American Art Now”. She recently completed a five-month residency at the Joan Mitchell Center, sponsored by the Joan Mitchell Foundation. Her work is in numerous collections including Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville New Orleans Museum of Art; Ogden Museum of Southern Art; 21c Museum, KY; the Drake Hotel, Toronto; Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation; Tulane University and House of Blues (various locations across US.); Fidelity Investments Corporate Collection; Josh Rechnitz, Thomas Coleman, Ellen and Cooper Manning, Lyn and John Fischbach and the collection of Marilyn Oshman.