philip high
biography
Philip High was born in Louisville, Kentucky and studied painting and ceramics at the University of Kentucky, in Lexington. He has been involved in computer graphics for over twenty-five years and has won awards for fine art and design in both traditional and digital media.
A current resume is available here.
statement
My current works are primarily abstractions on layered surfaces. I have been experimenting with acrylics and Tyvek (a synthetic paper-fabric hybrid) since the mid 1990’s, and using these materials as: paint on paper, collage, crushed paper/fabric hangings, and recently as low-relief constructions and wrapped panels. As much objects as images, the pieces present a physical record of the forces that shaped them, making them also a metaphor for the natural world, which I find a primary source of inspiration.
I am also interested in human “nature,” that is: consciousness, reason, motivation, perception and response. I would say that my true subject is our relationship to the dynamic interplay of inner and outer forces. While a piece usually develops from experiments with materials and visual relationships, I am always exploring how it might affect an observer directly, as well as how it indirectly communicates my own observations. If I have a message, it would be that knowledge and imagination are equally important and that beauty is the offspring of truth and wonder.
Within these contexts I am currently exploring several narrower themes. In the series, “Prismatic,” images are broken apart, as light through a prism, then reassembled and reworked into a multifaceted but cohesive composition. The effect is a crystal-like view that teases the attention into accepting the whole as greater than the sum of its parts.
“Sensory Data Array," uses the interplay of order and chaos as a stage on which to explore pattern and variation, all of which are fundamental expressions of nature and perception. The title also offers a reflection on human efforts to codify the potentiality of the universe with an overlay of logic and technology. As for pattern and variation, it is interesting to me to see how far a perceived structure can be altered and still retain it's original identity, as the wonder of "possibility" draws us forward into the unknown of an unfolding evolution.
The “Interconnect” series again speaks to my interests in chaos, order and interrelatedness. Like “Prismatic” it also uses a broken surface composition, but the parts are individually constructed and interwoven into a deeper texture for a more organic feeling.
“Convolve,” a verb form of “convolution,” takes paintings on sheets of soft-structure (crushed) Tyvek and transforms them into new pieces. But instead of cutting them apart they are wrapped and folded around a panel. Excess corners and edges are sometimes cut and repositioned along with added details. Visible metal hardware is used to reinforce the idea that this is no longer just a painting but a manmade hybrid.
Other series and individual pieces deal with the above themes as well, although sometimes in a more generalized way.