Philip Herbison

Philip Herbison
Stowe, Vermont

STATEMENT

Most of the art I create can be seen as both painting and sculpture. Using scrap materials left over from previous art projects I explore new aesthetic possibilities by. The many colors, textures, shapes and substances seem to offer themselves up to me as playthings of a two-year-old child. I don’t set out to express myself with this so much as to discover harmonies in the abstract, something like a jazz musician would do.

I also do a lot of photography and videography. My natural surroundings in the hills of Vermont has become the subject of several series consisting of abstract water formations of all kinds.

BIO

I was born and raised in Seattle, and I studied both fine arts and theatre arts at the University of Washington. In 1965, I decided to pursue studies in film production at San Francisco State University and received my BA degree in Film Production in 1968.

In 1970, I went to England for technical training at the London Film School. Upon completion of my studies there, I moved to Montreal where I immersed myself in the francophone culture of Quebec and worked for the next 25 years in the film and television industry there. During that period I pursued my interest in studio arts as a painter, had a number of exhibitions and ultimately earned a MFA degree at L’Université de Québec à Montréal.

In 1989, I took a hiatus from painting in order to make a documentary film examining the complex psychological relationships between humans and animals. Supported by grants from the Canada Council and the National Film Board of Canada, Animal Connections was completed in 1995 and won several awards at international film festivals.

While gratified by the challenges of film-making, the need to return to the daily practice of making art brought me back to the studio. Having married a Vermont woman, in 1992, I made the move from Montreal to Vermont and resumed my life as an artist. Since then my work has included primarily assemblages of wood scraps and found objects, while my photography has focused on my immediate natural environment which is in the hills of Vermont.

ARTIST CONTACT

(802) 253-1925
[click to email]
www.philipherbison.com

IMAGES