LEON PHILLIPS
Exploring The Materiality of Color

Raised on a Saskatchewan farm, West End artist Leon Phillip’s earliest perceptual experiences were shaped by the expansive prairie landscape.

Soon after high school, Leon was awarded scholarships to attend the University of Saskatchewan, where he completed a Bachelor of Arts and graduated with distinction, having majored in studio art. He then completed a Bachelor of Environmental Studies at the University of Waterloo School of Architecture in Waterloo, Ontario, where his final architecture project was included in a group exhibition on suburban planning and design at the Mississauga City Hall.

With his distinctive white beard and open and engaging smile, Leon is a well-known presence in the West End, where he has lived since his arrival in Vancouver in 1993.

In discussing his work, Leon says that his creative practice is “all about exploring the materiality of colour.”

Banff Residency, Leighton Artists Studios, Gerin-Lajoie Studio, Studio Installation View, January, 2020. (Click image to enlarge) — Banff Residency, Leighton Artists Studios, Gerin-Lajoie Studio, Studio Installation View, January, 2020. *(Click image to enlarge)*

Enlarging on this approach, Leon says: “I do this through physical engagement with my body, my brushes and the paint pigment,” he explains. “I am inspired by the notion that a painting is more than an image, that it is a presence. In pursuing a material-based logic, I work in a co-operative relationship with my studio materials and tools rather than dictating from above what they should do according to theoretical concepts.

“My paintings are drawn colour and are a choreographic record of my body’s movement. My gestures bump up against the edge of the picture plane and move with a consciousness of it. The brush width is expressed as it is— an assisted ready-made. My brushes are not inert tools, but are a dynamic medium through which the pigment is transmitted.

“Colour is never just colour in my work. It is always attached to the physical whether that is my body, my brushes or the paint. Working with the materiality of colour has led me to consider all of the non-human elements in my practice in a new and equitable way.”

Expand 7, Watercolour and gouache on Arches cold press paper, 15 x 20½ inches unframed, 2012. (click image to enlarge) — ***Expand 7*, Watercolour and gouache on Arches cold press paper, 15 x 20½ inches unframed, 2012. *(click image to enlarge)***

Leon’s painting career was launched with a solo show at The Canadian Consulate General in Chicago 1996 where he was the youngest Canadian artist featured. His work has been shown in solo exhibitions at The Community Arts Council Gallery in Vancouver, The Prince George Art Gallery, and the Yukon Art Centre in Whitehorse, as well as in group exhibitions in Canada and the United States.

Leon’s work has achieved international recognition as well. In 2013 his paintings were featured in Rewriting Lyotard: Figuration, Presentation, Resistance, a special issue of Cultural Politics published by Duke University Press. His essay “Lyotard’s Dance of Paint” was also published in that journal, and in 2017, his painting "Matrix 16" was featured on the cover of Differences: Rereading Beauvoir and Irigaray by Emily Anne Parker and Anne van Leeuwen, published by Oxford University Press.

In 2018, Leon was awarded a Merit Based Artists Grant by the Vermont Studio Centre, where he attended a one-month artist residency. In 2019, his work was featured in Art on Paper, a group show at Site:Brooklyn Gallery in New York City. NY. He was also accepted as a VCCA Fellow and attended a one-month artist residency at the Virginia Centre for Creative Arts in Amherst, Virginia. Last year, he was also accepted to be a member of The Painting Centre’s Art File Gallery in New York City.

Matrix 7, oil on canvas, 16 x 19 inches, 2013. (click image to enlarge) — ***Matrix 7*, oil on canvas, 16 x 19 inches, 2013. *(click image to enlarge)***

In January of this year Leon attended the Leighton Artists Studio program at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity where he held a one-month independent artist residency in the Gerin-Lajoie Studio. More recently, he was awarded a Project Assistance for Visual Artists grant by the British Columbia Arts Council.

Leon works in a home studio in the west of Denman apartment he shares with his long-time partner, Vancouver Sun reporter Kevin Griffin. “Our apartment is north-facing and the second bedroom is just big enough to work in. The light is wonderful” he reports.

In September 2021, Leon is scheduled to attend the International Painting Symposium "Mark Rothko 2021" at the Daugavpils Mark Rothko Art Centre in Latvia. This will be the first presentation of his work in Europe and he is understandably excited at the prospect.

See more of Leon’s work at his website here.