Petra Projects is pleased to present orderline, at Mehr Gallery, featuring the paintings of Matt Phillips and the drawings and textiles of Eliza Stamps in a two-person show exhibiting June 28-July 25, 2007. orderline opens June 28, 6 to 9pm.

Matt Phillips views painting as an “evolving and living language” as artists attempt to discover a means by which to express the world around them. Phillips’ interest is rooted in how color interaction evokes a specific light, describes space, or depicts a unique form, as well as in the use of repetitive and discrete marks to arrive at a final image. His approach results in “describing forms in varying states of expansion and compression, materialization and dissolution”. Phillips seeks to surpass the simplicity of forms by referencing quilts, mosaics, architecture and other tangible objects, thereby creating multiple visual possibilities.

Originally from Roanoke, Virginia, Matt Phillips received a Bachelors Degree in Visual Art and Art History from Hampshire College. After participating in exhibitions in both New York and Virginia, Phillips pursued a Masters of Fine Arts Degree from Boston University in May 2007 with a Constantin Alajalov Scholarship and in 2007 was honored as a Kahn Award Finalist.

Eliza Stamps works between textiles and drawings, creating symmetry between the movements of needles and pencils. In both mediums, she reflects the use of order in all aspects of existence, “the passage of people and animals through space, the movement of cells through the body, the transition of emotions through the psyche”. Each piece ultimately explores shape and composition, providing a sense of metric sequence to both animate and inanimate matters.

Eliza spent her formative years in Newton, Massachusetts, and pursued a Bachelors Degree in Visual Art and Art History at Bates College. From there, she went on to receive a Masters of Fine Arts Degree from Pratt Institute in 2006. Stamps also works as an art educator in Brooklyn, Queens and Manhattan middle schools integrating visual arts into curricula ranging from ESL to Social Studies. She recently participated in exhibitions at 440 Gallery, and Gallery on Dean, both in Brooklyn, NY.