“I often use painting as a way to reflect,” Pat Phillips said on the eve of his new solo show at M+B Gallery in Los Angeles. “A way to unpack memories, past traumas, and experiences that seemed pretty normal by 90’s/early 2000’s standards. Mythologies we repeated…games we played…phrases we spoke…even our relationships. As I get older, I think about these events. Frequently embellished or glossed over…how that party was so dope!, but someone dropped the N-bomb. Sometimes as a means of survival this meant laughing it off to show everyone you weren’t “a pussy.” Sometimes that meant punching someone in the face… Strange Suburb is a visual diary of these lived experiences.”
