CLINTON, IA – The Clinton Community College Library Art Gallery is hosting an exhibit of pieces by Augustana College Professor of Art Vickie R. Phipps through November. The exhibit titled “If We Were All Eyes Could We See Each Other?” includes colorful whimsical characters. An Artist Reception will be held on Thursday, November 2 at 4 p.m. The community is invited to enjoy the pieces during college hours. The Library Art Gallery is open Monday through Thursday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and is located at the CCC main campus, 1000 Lincoln Blvd., Clinton. Clinton Community College is one of the Eastern Iowa Community Colleges.
Vickie R. Phipps serves as Associate Professor of Art, Graphic Design at Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois. Vickie has worked with a wide range of brands including HGTV, DIY, Food Network, Ford, GMC, Hershey’s, Paramount Pictures, Warner Brothers, Lowes, 3M, Target, Sherwin-Williams, and Kodak. Vickie has shown around the nation including at Black Mountain Art Center in North Carolina, Colby-Sawyers College in New Hampshire, Memorial Union Gallery in North Dakota, Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, and Concordia University in Minnesota. This is the first time Vickie has shown work in Clinton. She is grateful for this opportunity and would like to thank artist and Lead Professor Christopher Legel as well as Clinton Community College.
When asked what inspires her work, Phipps stated, “Fresh air and ideas. I feel a kind of addictive aliveness when I encounter a new idea (via my own process of thinking or interactions with the world around me.)”
Phipps commented that she was an artist long before she learned the word artist sharing, “The first work I remember making was on a (now vintage) magic slate drawing board, the kind with a red pencil on top. My magic slate had Disney characters around the edges. One day as my parents worked on a house project, I drew one of the characters. When I showed it to my parents, they did not believe I had drawn it and asked me to do it again. I was very young. And I have been drawing ever since. It is just something I have always done: make things.”
A unique feature of this exhibit is that the pieces have not yet been named. Clinton Community College is holding a contest to name the colorful characters. For more information, contact CCC at 563-244-7001.
