Sunday, September 25, 2005

1:30 to 3:00 PM

1218 Chelsea Avenue

Santa Monica, CA 90404

PHYLLIS GREEN makes sculpture in a variety of media including clay. Her current work explores issues of gender in romance and in art as well as issues of craft and decoration. The forms are hybrids of traditional male and female representation: soft and hard, perorated and projecting, inside and outside. They intend to tease our assumptions about gender, and identify as toys as much as precious objects. They are loaded to evoke all manner of “feminine” illusions by the use of such materials as flocking, feathers, and fine fabric. Together they challenge the lingering modernist assumption that devalues decoration and ornament as enemies of “high art.” Green will show us her home and studio, give a PowerPoint presentation, and answer questions about her work.

Phyllis Green holds an MFA from UCLA and is the recipient of individual artists fellowships from the NEA, CAC and Pollock-Krasner Foundations. She was among the first group of artists to be awarded a prestigious COLA grant by the City of Los Angeles in 1996. She has lectured in colleges and universities around the country and is currently an adjunct faculty member of the art departments of Loyola Marymount University, UCLA and USC. Her work has been exhibited extensively in Southern California, as well as in solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally. From 1996 to 1998 she produced and hosted “LOOK/hear,” a weekly radio show on the visual arts in Southern California for 88.9FM KXLU Los Angeles. In 2004, she was elected Chair of the Santa Monica Arts Commission.