[no title] 1970

Curator: This intriguing piece is by Esq Tom Phillips, currently held in the Tate Collections. What strikes you first about this diminutive work? Editor: It feels like a half-remembered dream, or maybe a faded postcard from a place that never quite existed. The text fragments layered over those stripes... Curator: Yes, Phillips often uses found texts, isolating words and phrases, then layering them within a new visual context. The rhythmic stripes draw the eye and guide us through the scattered words. Editor: There's a tension between the formality of the stripes and the almost whimsical scattering of words. "Huge trunks and primroses" juxtaposed with "the old regime"... It’s quite evocative. Curator: Indeed. Phillips’s work invites us to create our own narratives, to find connections within the disjointed phrases. Each viewer constructs their own story, perhaps a memory triggered by a chance encounter with language. Editor: It’s a puzzle, in a very gentle, inviting way. Not a harsh riddle, but a whispered suggestion of meaning. Makes you want to linger. Curator: Precisely. And to let your imagination fill in the gaps.