RICHARD PHILLIPS

Phillips uses collaborative forms of image production to reorder the relationship of Pop art to its subjects. The staging and format of his films presage the return of their subjects as paintings; eventually, they form the foundation for lush, large-scale works such as Sasha (2012), Lindsay II (2012), and Lindsay III (2012), realist portraits of the place-holders of their own mediated existence. In addition to working with Lohan and Grey, Phillips has collaborated with Brazilian supermodel Adriana Lima to create a new series of paintings that depict her against backdrops of iconic Brazilian landmarks, such as Oscar Niemeyer’s Cathédral de Brasília, the patterned sidewalks of Copa Cabana, and the favelas of Rio. In these scenes, such as Adriana I (2012), in which Lima poses seductively across the roof of the cathedral, the impact of her preternatural beauty and the aura she commands as a supermodel is conflated, and thus equated with, national icons of economic, political, and religious culture.