DALLAS, TX.- Dallas Contemporary announces “Negation of the Universe,” an exhibition of work by Richard Phillips (American, b. 1962), on view from April 11-August 10, 2014. Phillips’ first solo museum exhibition in the United States, “Negation of the Universe” surveys his work of the past two decades and encompasses over 40 paintings, sculptures and films. The exhibition offers a unique opportunity to experience the full scope of his exploration into political and social identity; consumerism; eroticized desire; and social constraints through multiple media in a single space.

Critique is as intrinsic to Phillips’ works as the tangible media used to create them. His conflating of subject and genre continues to provide challenging commentary on the condition and reach of contemporary art. In a style that both embraces and challenges tradition, Phillips engages a complex web of human obsessions—sexuality, politics, power, death--that are continuously exploited throughout popular media. With subjects ranging from George W. Bush to actresses such as Dakota Fanning and Sasha Gray, he questions the foundation of high art by injecting it with popular culture.

The exhibition includes early paintings from Phillips’ 1997 exhibition at Turner & Runyon Gallery in Dallas, including Mask, which depicts a towel-wrapped woman covered in cold cream. First Point, which portrays actress Lindsay Lohan, is presented alongside Phillips’ short film from which the painted image derives. Playboy Marfa, a three-part installation comprising a blacked-out Dodge Charger, a concrete plinth, and a neon bunny icon, was first shown on site in Marfa, Texas in 2013 and has been re-installed here.

“Dallas Contemporary is thrilled to be organizing Richard Phillips' first museum exhibition in the United States,” said Dallas Contemporary Director Peter Doroshenko. "Since the early 1990s, Phillips has challenged the formal structures of painting, pushing the boundaries like no other artist. I am thrilled Dallas Contemporary is hosting this major exhibition with such an important artist and popular culture provocateur."