Tom Phillips

1927 - 2005

While many Western artists can claim to have some authentic connection with cowboy culture, Thomas Embert Phillips was a real Indian. Born in Chickasah, Oklahoma, Tom Phillips was a Chickasaw Indian through his great grandmother. Tom’s talent and interest in art were so obvious that by the age of nine his father enrolled him in the Helen Lorenze Art School in Oklahoma City, where he studied for the next seven years.

At the age of 18, Phillips joined the Merchant Marines and served as an artist with the 45th Infantry in Korea. Following the war, Phillips continued his studies at Phillips University in Enid, Oklahoma, the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, and the Kansas City Art Institute.

For the next 20 years Phillips worked as a commercial illustrator in New York, Colorado Springs, and Kansas City. During that time, he worked as an illustrator for the American Hereford Association, which resulted in the publication of The Sketches of Tom Phillips in 1971, featuring illustrations from Hereford cattle ranches across the country.

By 1970 Phillips had decided to devote himself to fine art as a painter and sculptor whose work authentically represented Native American history.

Among Phillips’ many interesting commissions were the Lakota Buffalo Days diorama and Paha Sapa Wakan, The Sacred Black Hills, both housed in the Aktá Lakota Museum at St. Joseph's Indian School in Chamberlain, South Dakota; a postage stamp for Mexico; and a painting depicting the Chickasaws’ first meeting with Hernando de Soto for the centennial celebration of the Chickasaw National Capitol building.

Phillips’ 1988 painting Paha Sapa Wakan, The Sacred Black Hills is perhaps the most interesting of his commissions. Surprisingly, it was inspired by Flashman and the Redskins by G. M. Frazer, a book in a series of historical novels that have a reputation for being based on accurate historical facts. As always, Phillips meticulously researched the subject to produce the highly detailed painting and wrote a seven-page essay about the subject. It is an especially large watercolor painting in three scenes or panels, depicting three historically significant events, in 1874, 1875, and 1876, that began with the discovery of gold in the Black Hills of South Dakota and culminated with the signing of an agreement between the United States Government and the Sioux Nation, represented by about 150 Sioux Chiefs and headmen. The agreement requiring the Sioux give up their claim to the Black Hills superseded the treaty of 1868 that guaranteed the Black Hills belonged to the Sioux.

In 1991 Tom was authorized to paint a scene from the Academy Award winning movie Dances with Wolves. The painting is titled The Chase and hangs in the South Dakota Hall of Fame.

Phillips was inducted into the Chickasaw Hall of Fame in 1998 and was honored with "The Master Heritage Award" from the Five Civilized Tribes Museum in Muskogee, Oklahoma.

A MOUNTAIN MAN IN A SNOWSTORM Oil on Linen 1972 11 ¼ x 15 inches