Julia Phillips was born and raised in Hamburg and is the citizen of Germany and the United States. She relocated to New York in 2013 for graduate school, and has been based there since, while attending several international residency programs, and joining faculty at DoVA in the fall of 2018.
Alongside works on paper and videos, Phillips works primarily with ceramics and metal, creating sculptures reminiscent of functional objects. The ”tools” and “apparatuses" suggest a use for the human body and their titles point to physical, social, and psychological relations. Phillips describes her intellectual interests to be framed by psychoanalytic and Black feminist thought, as well as postcolonial questions and issues of social Belonging.
Her most recent exhibitions are her solo exhibition ‘Fake Truth’ at Kunstverein Braunschweig in Germany, the group exhibition ‘Feminist Histories: Artists After 2000’ at MASP, São Paulo, and the group exhibition ‘The Violence of Gender’ at Tai Kwun Hong Kong. In 2018 Phillips had her first institutional solo exhibition 'Failure Detection’ at MoMA PS1 and participated in the 10th Berlin Biennial ‘We don’t need another hero’.
Phillips’ work has been reviewed in several art papers, such as Artforum, The New Yorker, BOMB Magazine, and Contemporary& Magazine. Phillips’ writing has recently been published by Mousse Magazine, and the Heinrich-Böll-Foundation, in cooperation with the Center for Intersectional Justice.
Selected Publications
'Reach Everyone on the Planet…' — Kimberlé Crenshaw and Intersectionality, text contribution 'Can We Get a Witness?' from Julia Phillips, published by Gunda-Werner-Institute in the Heinrich Böll Foundation, in cooperation with the Center for Intersectional Justice, 2019
Review of Solo Exhibition 'Failure Detection' at MoMA PS1, Sculpture Magazine, Jan/Feb 2019, issue by Jonathan Goodman, 2019
Review of Solo Exhibition 'Failure Detection' at MoMA PS1, Zack Hatfield, Artforum, September 2018 issue, Vol. 57, No. 1, 2018
"In Minimalism Everything Counts", Interview with Will Furtado, Contemporary& Magazine, Print Issue #9, 2018
"Do You Believe in Evil?", In Conversation with Aaron Gilbert, Mousse Magazine, Issue 62, 2018
Selected Exhibitions
"Fake Truth", Solo, Kunstverein Braunschweig, Germany, 2019
"Failure Detection", Solo, MoMA PS1, New York City, USA, 2018
"Feminist Histories: Artists After 2000", Group, MASP, São Paulo, Brasil, 2019
"Performing Society: The Violence of Gender", Group, Tai Kwun Art Center, Hong Kong, China, 2019
"We don’t need another hero", Group, 10th Berlin Biennale, Berlin, Germany, 2018
"Songs for Sabotage", Group, New Museum Triennial, New York City, USA, 2018