Lawrence Philp (b. 1949)
Lawrence Philp (b. 1949)
Lawrence Philp (b. 1949)
Lawrence Philp, the son of Jamaican immigrants, studied at the Rhode Island School of Design and the University of Michigan and has painted for four decades. His colorful and dynamic works draw from a myriad of sources from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance to the present day.
Based in Palm Coast, Florida, he creates two kinds of work: acrylic paint on canvas and mixed media constructions, both of which we are pleased to present in this exhibition.
He has exhibited extensively in both group and solo exhibitions since the 1960’s and has served as artist-in-residence at Gallery 53 Artworks, through an New York State Council on the Arts grant, in printmaking in Cooperstown, New York. In addition to his creative work, he has served as an educator in a variety of settings, including as a visiting artist at Middlebury (VT) College (1996) and Hartwick College, Roundhouse Press, Oneonta, New York (1992); leading the symposium, Artists of Diverse Cultures: Towards an Inclusive Art History, hosted by Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Studio Museum in Harlem (NY) in 1987; and demonstrations and lectures at SUNY College of Oneonta, NY; SUNY Cobleskill Art Department, and Hartwick College, Oneonta, NY.
Lawrence Philip: Works of Intercultural Osmosis
by Chenoa Baker
Within the discipline of art history, there are several avenues of study: historiography (the history of theorists who wrote about art), formalism (approaching art as a document to be read and interpreted based on the visual alone), and connoisseurship (taking in a breadth of visual experiences to identify the works, patterns, and context through deductive reasoning).1 Furthermore, connoisseurs are taught how to “identify artworks by time, culture and authorship.”2 Connoisseurship, often seen as antiquated as opposed to critical thinking, has innateness to African American and Caribbean experiences. Many of us cling to forms of ‘ancestral
arts,’ even if we don’t know why or from whence it came, as referred to by Alain Locke. It reflects the adage: we came to the Americas empty-handed but not emptyheaded. Patterns, color, geometry, and glyphs permeate us like muscle memory. Lawrence Philip’s colorful, grid-like works are proof of this osmotic absorption.
He works in an automatic style meaning that he draws continuously from intuition/ spirit as the guide.3 The first hint of the African continent is in its reminiscence of Kongolese cosmograms, extensively talked about in the catalogue, when it says, “While Philip’s pictographic,
1 https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2020/02/29/the-case-is-made-for-connoisseurs-andtheir-role-in-art-history
2 https://faculty.philosophy.umd.edu/jhbrown/connoisseur/index.html
3 Lawrence Phillips: Color Grid, 2022. University of Maryland Global Campus, Arts Program.
Temptation of Saint Agnes, 1977-78, detail
abstract, mixed media color gridwork is not exactly Central African in form, there is no denying that his conceptual drawings of every day, objects and street-level detritus (e.g., telephones, fruit, cars,houses, bicycles, trains, traffic, lights, cardboard, crumpled paper, images of graffiti, and a mismatch of lines, squiggles, and shapes) from his work in New York City embody the spirit and elemental aspects of the Kongo graphic writing format.”4 Flashlight for George Clinton and Parliament-Funkadelic (1995) even has the word vèvè in it (top right corner) — a Haitian vodou script of Kongolese cosmograms in the Americas inscribed on the ground to summon specific spirits.
His breadth of work is similar to Hale Woodruff’s Ashanti Image (1946). Woodruff loosely incorporates the forms of Adinkra of the Akan Empire into a horizontal painted composition. The abstracted geometric characters look similar to the imagined rectilinear and curvilinear formsthat Philip’s grids display. To further show the call and response, the curatorial team 4 Ibid, 5. 5 Ibid.
Golf Course of Life, c. 1972, detail
of Touching Roots: Black Ancestral Legacies in the Americas, an African American art survey at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in 2022, paired the work beside Akan gold weights that embody the adinkra symbols and how they carry on proverbial truths in their aesthetic along with their functionality. Woodruff was deeply informed by Alain Locke’s The New Negro philosophy and may or may not have seen Adinkra symbols up close.
Akin to “patchwork,” as described by Carter B. Cue, and storytelling quilts,5 that have a rich history in the Black Atlantic, Philip’s works exude the sensibility of Harriet Powers and Gee’s Bend Quilters. Harriet Powers’ infamous Pictorial Quilt (1895-98) depicts Masonic symbols and Biblical imagery. She draws from an Antebellum quilt tradition of appliqué and silhouettes for pre-literate audiences. Even Philip addresses Biblical iconography in Expulsion From the Garden (197273) and The Temptation of Saint Anthony (1973).
Lawrence Philp (b. 1949)
Flickers of Bob Thompson’s rhythmic flying figures, color palate, and mythological creatures in an interplay of “order and chaos,”6 combined with Robert Colescott’s satire in works like Nobody Told Me I Had a Banana on My Head (1973-76), Golf Course of Life (1972), and Some of These Chicks are Afraid of Me (1970). In Nobody Told Me I Had a Banana on My Head, the central abstracted figure carries a Carmen Miranda-like fruit assortment of bananas on their head, a watermelon rind, a pair of sunglasses, and other unidentifiable imagery. It leans under the impossible balance of the disproportionate objects on the head. The corners don red smiling lips, skyscrapers, speech bubbles, Mickey Mouse ears, a sun peeking
behind a cloud, and other miscellaneous blobs and markmaking. It unveils a critique of minstrel performance and modernity.
Lastly, Philip has the imprint of New York City within his drawings through the crowded blocks, urban subject matter, and Neo-Expressionist markings like the advent of graffiti. Through the lens of growing up there with Jamaican immigrant parents, his world becomes an Africanized tapestry that he shares through reappropriating the grid that often oppressively keeps folks in line through redlining and lined paper for handwriting (hinted at in S.M.I.B made in 1995). He paves the way for many emerging artists like Naudline Pierre and more.i
6 https://americanart.si.edu/artist/bob-thompson-4784
• Lawrence Philp (b. 1949)
Paintings
Golf Course of Life, c. 1972
oil and acrylic on canvas
60 x 60 inches
Untitled, 1977
Oil and acrylic on canvas
70 x 60 inches
Temptation of Saint Agnes, 1977-78 oil and acrylic on canvas 73 x 60 inches
Philp (b. 1949)
Adventure of batman in the city, c.1976 assemblage (wood and acrylic) on canvas, on cradled board 49 x 37 inches signed
73
Untitled #4, 1977
acrylic on canvas
x 60 inches
yoruba, c. 1970-71
oil and acrylic on canvas
72 x 60 inches
The Death of Picasso, 1973
acrylic and oil on canvas 61-1/2 x 61-1/2 inches
Untitled, c. 1969
acrylic and oil on canvas 38 x 25-1/2 inches signed
Untitled, c. 1970
acrylic and oil on canvas
52 x 61 inches
in the garden on the beach, 1976
acrylic and oil on canvas
62 x 61 inches
alternative titled on verso: A Wander[er] Visits Thompsonville
Works on Paper
Leaving Home Series
Drawing in search of an Airmail stamp, 1995 crayon, pastel crayon, and collage
53-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
SMIB, 1995 crayon, pastel crayon, and collage 54-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Auto bio journal, 1995
crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Neon Air, 1995
crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper
51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Luna Poem, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper
51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
sewing machine singer pattern, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper
51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Untitled, 1994 wax crayon, oil pastel, tempera, collage, and china marker on paper 51-1/2 x 41 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
You Can’t Stop Running Water, 1995
crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper
51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
ghosts of the badly killed come back, 1995 crayon, pastel crayon on pieced paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Untitled, 1995 oil pastel and mixed media on paper
51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Untitled, 1995 crayon, pastel crayon on pieced paper
51-1/2 x 40-1/2 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Otsego County, Yak Yak, 1995 crayon, pastel crayon on pieced paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Chalice and Handgrenade with text, 1995 crayon, pastel crayon, collage, and tempera on pieced paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Landscape with treeline, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
untitled, 1995 crayon, oil pastel, collage, graphite and marker on paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
S.m.I.b, 1996 crayon and pastel crayon on paper 52 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
s.m.i.b, 1995
crayon and pastel crayon on paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
untitled, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on paper 51-1/2 x 40-1/2 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
s.m.i.b, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on paper 51-1/2 x 40-1/2 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Victorian Limits, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on paper
51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
s.m.i.b, 1995
crayon and pastel crayon on paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Yellowman Tea Break, 1995
crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper
51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Otsego County Landscape, For eddie o’jay, WWRL Radio, NYC, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper
51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
s.m.i.b, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
s.m.i.b, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Otsego county Landscape with peanut, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Otsego county Landscape, 1995 crayon and pastel crayon on pieced paper 51-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Otsego county Road map (For J.m. Basquiat), 1995 crayon, pastel crayon, and collage on pieced paper 53-1/2 x 40 inches signed
Leaving Home Series
Solo Exibitions
2022 Lawrence Philp’s Color Grid, University of Maryland Global Campus
2019 Lawrence Philp: Works on Paper from the Series 16 Times 8 Equals 1, Lockhart Gallery, SUNY, Geneseo, NY
2003 Lawrence J. Philp, Resident Artist, Stanley Gallery, The Arts Center, St. Petersburg, FL
1998 Flagler County Auditorium, Bunnell, FL
1995 Albany Center Gallery, NY
1994 Kubiak Gallery, Upper Catskill Community; Council of Arts, Oneonta, NY
1993 Lawrence Philp: Works on Paper, Gallery 53 Artworks, Cooperstown, NY
1984 A Place Apart Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
1981 Langston Hughes Community Library and Cultural Center, Corona, NY
1976 Xochipilli Gallery, Rochester, MI
120 in the Shade Gallery, Lansing, MI
group ExHibitions
2017 GAP V Mazatlan, Global Artist Project, Baupres Gallery, Mazatlan, Mexico
100 Years/100 Artists, Morean Arts Center, St. Petersburg, FL
2016 Art x 9, The Casements, Ormond Beach, FL
2014 Expressionism; Mary McLeod Bethune Performing Arts Center and Visual Arts Gallery, Daytona Beach, FL
I Kan Do Dat; Skylight Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Odyssey; Mar y McLeod Bethune Performing Arts Center and Visual Arts Gallery, Daytona Beach, FL
Forte; Mary McLeod Bethune Performing Arts Center and Visual Arts Gallery, Daytona Beach, FL
2013 Three Roads to Now: A Show of Works by William B. Brant, Donald Kolberg, and Lawrence Philp, Larimar Arts Center, Palatka, FL
2010 Art from Private Collections, Peg Alston Fine Arts, Dayton Beach, FL
Selected Contemporary Works by Regional Artists, Hollingsworth Gallery, Palm Coast, FL
Music Theme Exhibition, Hollingsworth Gallery, Palm Coast, FL
2003 Nurturing the New Benefit Exhibition of Fine Art; NUTUREart, Chelsea, NY
2001 66th Annual National Invitational; Cooperstown Art Association, Cooperstown, NY
Artist-in-Residence Exhibition; Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Snowmass Village, CO
1999 Annual Holiday Show, Artists-inResidence and Staff Exhibition; Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Snowmass Village, CO
1995 Adamec, Dempsey, Nuzum, Philp: Ceramics, Paintings, and Drawings; Buckham Gallery, Flint, MI
1994 The Art of the Game, 13th Annual Fine Arts Baseball Exhibition; Gallery 53 Artworks, Cooperstown, NY
Retrospectum on Paper; Buckham Gallery, Flint, MI
Philp/Volo; Adams Art Gallery, Dunkirk, NY
Big and Little Show; Cooperstown Art Association, NY
1994 Art on Fire; Bremer Farm, Otego, NY
1993 Figuring it Out on Paper: Prints from the Printmaking Workshop; Foreman Gallery, Harwick College, Oneonta, NY
group ExHibitions
1992 Historical Crosscuts Juried Exhibition; Buckham Fine Arts Project, Buckham Gallery, Flint, MI
The Child; Pyramid Gallery, Rochester, NY
Jazz Dimensions ‘92; Schenectady Museum, NY
1991 Extra Innings, Annual Baseball Show, Gallery 53 Artworks, Cooperstown, NY
Beyond Boundaries: Narrative Works on Fiber and Paper Inspired by Personal Histories and Distant Places; Gallery 53 Artworks, Cooperstown, NY
Faculty Exhibition, Foreman Gallery, Hartwick College, Oneonta, NY
Ninth Annual Tribute to Black Artists Exhibition; Pyramid Gallery, Rochester, NY
1990 In Our Own Voices; Bevier Gallery, Rochester Insitute of Technology, NY
Biennial Faculty Exhibition; Foreman Gallery, Hartwick College, Oneonta, NY
David MacDonald and Lawrence Philp: Recent Ceramics and Paintings; Fine Arts Gallery, SUNY Oneonta, NY
Contemporary African-American Printmakers; Lyman Allyn Art Museum, New London, CT
Recent Trends in Work on Paper; Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires; Argentina
1989 7 Up and Coming; Kenkeleba Gallery, NY
1983 New American Artists; Just Above Midtown/Downtown Gallery, New York, NY
Philp/Jow, two-person exhibition, Basement Workshop, New York, NY
Down and Out of New York; Wake Forest University Gallery, Winston Salem, NC
Jazzonia Gallery Inaugural Group Show, Detroit, MI
1980 Dorsey’s Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
1978 Rhode Island School of Design, Alumni Show, Woods Gerry Gallery, Providence, RI
1976 Annual Mid-Year Show; Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, OH
Pacesetting Trends in the Multiplicity of the Current Scene, Trumbull Art Guild, Warren, OH
1975 Central Michigan University Faculty Show; Midland Council of the Arts, Midland, MI
1971 Detroit Art Jazz; Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI
Installation shots, Black Art Auction
BLACK ART AUCTION @2024