[no title: p. 205] 1970

Curator: This intriguing work, "[no title: p. 205]" by Esq Tom Phillips, presents an altered book page now held in the Tate Collections. It feels intensely layered. Editor: Indeed, the composition strikes me first. The obscuring of the text with washes of green and brown, interrupted by cut-out words, creates an almost palimpsestic effect. It is fragmentary yet somehow whole. Curator: Phillips’s process is key here. He reclaims and manipulates existing printed matter, raising questions about originality and the labour involved in artistic production versus literary creation. Editor: Yet, the visual rhythm established by the overlaid stripes and the negative space carved out around select phrases gives the work a strong internal logic. What is "fashioned" here, if not a new visual order? Curator: It is the very act of altering and recontextualizing the original materials that generates meaning. Editor: Perhaps. It is a fascinating interplay of destruction and creation.