On April 12, 2012 I went to Philippe’s senior exhibit show titled Fetish123. It’s called Fetish, because most of his work there was made from his skin (like dandruff and hair), therefore they are his fetishes. This closing reception was what I expected it to be, such as there were a lot of people looking at his work and just hanging around. He spoke about the show as a whole; he thanked a couple of people and said that most of his work was for sale.
His work was more Dionysian than Apollonian or it was more chaotic than monotonous. The shapes in some or most of his work was organic, complex, and irregular. A lot of the lines were diagonal, curved, thick and thin. Most of the colors he used were on the darker side such a lot of reds and blues. The value of the work was mostly dark and some of the pieces had a rough texture while others had glossy texture. The spacing in some of the pieces was advancing while other parts were extending. I think almost all of his work had a busy figure ground relationship.
The balance of his work was asymmetrical, the rhythm had a fluid progression and the proportion was abstract and naturalism. The attitudinal characteristics were dramatic, powerful, passionate, proud and confident. The values and behaviors that really shaped reality were freedom, premeditative and spontaneity, intoxication, and passion.
On one of the walls in the gallery was the word FeTiSH written and right under that were the elements of the periodic table that they represent. So Fe is Iron, Ti is Titanium, S is Sulfur and H is Hydrogen. I found that to really interesting the way he incorporated the elements in the title. On the wall to the right he had an inspirational wall, with pictures taken by different art teachers along with other memorabilia pieces. All of his work was so interesting that it was very hard to look to another piece. There is one piece in particular that really caught my eye; it reminded me of the sun setting on the ocean because the top looked as if the sun was starting to set and the rest looked like a reflection on water. This piece was very calming and peaceful to look at. I really enjoyed this closing reception, it inspired me to try new things and not to just stick to one something.
