Inter-generational labour lies at the heart of Phillip Rhys Olney’s practice. Hailing from three generations of dockyard workers, he consults the aesthetics of working-class culture - viewing the traces of ancestral and contemporary labour as a repository for legacies, stories and culture.
Olney’s works see labour as a vital component of meaningful art practice, and are drawn from the detritus of locations in which he has worked. In their reproduction and consolidation, these remnants interrogate the cultural role of sites of both traditional and contemporary working industries. Olney's latent attention toward sites of labour casts artistic practice within the workplace as political action, using materials produced 'surplus to need' through employment as indicators of the oft-overlooked yet generative practices within it.
Phillip graduated as a First-Generation University Student with First Class Honours from the University of Oxford and with a Distinction as Sir Frank Bowling Scholar at Chelsea College of Art & Design, alongside achieving his Level 2 Diploma in Bench Joinery at The Building Crafts College.
Most recently, Phillip has completed a three month Fellowship alongside the British Museum and a residency at Acrylicize, in collaboration with the Working Class Creatives Database. He has previously been shortlisted for the Brixton Art Prize, and longlisted for the UK New Artist of the YearAward.
Olney’s works see labour as a vital component of meaningful art practice, and are drawn from the detritus of locations in which he has worked. In their reproduction and consolidation, these remnants interrogate the cultural role of sites of both traditional and contemporary working industries. Olney's latent attention toward sites of labour casts artistic practice within the workplace as political action, using materials produced 'surplus to need' through employment as indicators of the oft-overlooked yet generative practices within it.
Phillip graduated as a First-Generation University Student with First Class Honours from the University of Oxford and with a Distinction as Sir Frank Bowling Scholar at Chelsea College of Art & Design, alongside achieving his Level 2 Diploma in Bench Joinery at The Building Crafts College.
Most recently, Phillip has completed a three month Fellowship alongside the British Museum and a residency at Acrylicize, in collaboration with the Working Class Creatives Database. He has previously been shortlisted for the Brixton Art Prize, and longlisted for the UK New Artist of the YearAward.