Natalie Phillips Goes it Alone

“My mom is the only person who noticed that the baby
is smoking fetuses out of a placenta pipe,” says Natalie Phillips of
her busy illustration “Red Sky.” Using gouache and acrylic paint on
Bristol board, Phillips takes the viewer back to an ’80s sci-fi comic
book aesthetic. Drifting through a white-dots-on-black version of outer
space, fetuses rise from the baby’s pipe and collect into a pod shape
at the top right. The baby wears what Phillips calls a “geisha
headdress,” composed of a woman, legs spread-eagle, neck craned,
birthing a bouquet of vein patterns which flow between flowers and
remember-me ribbons.

The 22-year-old’s surreal illustrations
achieve a distinct
busyness, reading as a dissociative response to her rocky start in
Portland. In April of 2008, after graduating from UC Santa Cruz,
Phillips moved into town to reunite with her father and boyfriend. “But
as soon as I got here my dad left and my boyfriend and I broke up,” she
explains. “I was left without a car or a job and was living on a boat.”
She painted through the hard times, using passion as distraction.

“I’m so glad I stuck it out,” says Phillips, referring to her recent
series of successes. This April, Phillips showcased several pieces at
the Stumptown Comics Festival, as well as at Vorpal Space for a solo
show that was extended through the month of May. Inspired by a flyer
for the Vorpal exhibit, Breeze Block offered Phillips a solo show that
opens on Friday, June 5.

On the Vorpal walls, “New Mexican Wedding Night” features two nude
women wearing Native American headdresses, their limbs like ivy, curled
in an embrace. In the would-be negative space, dense florets of skull
and rib grow endlessly into one another. With this psychedelic
bone-thicket, a modernized version of ’60s Bay Area poster
art—morose, heavy-metal design motifs spawning
throughout—Phillips has proven her ability to consume the ADD
gaze.

Lately, Phillips’ blog (nataliebluephillips.com) has been
filling up with images of new work. The backgrounds in her most recent
pieces have calmed down considerably. Whether this comes as a product
of contentment, her high-demand status, or her recent design work for
Portland-based Foyer Clothing, it’s certain that Phillips’
illustrations are quickly evolving into something distinct and
memorable.