Featured In Our Paper - The Vicksburg Post

Robert Phillips and his wife, Marian, display some of the art that he made during his time at Shady Lawn Health and Rehabilitation.

Bob and I, with his copper trees and paintings, were featured and humbled by the fact that we were in Sunday's hometown paper, The Vicksburg Post.  It was the idea of, Deborah Hughes, his Activity Director at Shady Lawn Nursing Home while he was a patient there getting physical therapy back in August.  Below is the article that was written by Terri Cowart Frazier.  We want to thank her as well for putting together a great article called, Branching Out and to photographer, Eli Baylis, for taking pictures for the article.  

Late art bloomer inspires Shady Lawn residents

Robert Phillips' life, like the branches of the miniature trees he meticulously crafts from copper, has spread in many direction.

The local artist regularly takes his artistic skills to Shady Lawn Health and Rehabilitation, sharing and inspiring residents while receiving his own treatment at the facility.

The 70-year-old Detroit native didn't get into art until later in life, but now he's making up for lost time, not only producing the trees, but taking brush to canvas as well.

Christie Martin, Registered Nurse, director of nursing at Shady Lawn, said Phillips has been a short-term resident on several occasions.

He comes in to receive physical therapy care, and during his stays he demonstrates and shares his art with the other residents, "and if they want to join in they can," Martin said.

One of the projects he demonstrates for the residents at the facility is his copper trees.

Phillips said he uses copper wire that he has cut in graduated lengths.  He skins the plastic covering from around the wire and then joins the wires, by twisting them together, like wring out a towel.  

"It takes a pretty good amount of twisting," he said.

He then pulls individual wires from the bundle and begins shaping them to form branches.

Phillips' wife, Marian, assists in gluing wooden bases to the bottom of the trees, he said.

Sometimes he will decorate the trees, too, said Marian Phillips.

Robert Phillips said the idea of the copper trees came to him about while in the woods hunting.

Bored and fixating on a white oak tree, Phillips said he began visualizing how he could make a tree to resemble the oak.  

"I used a lead-type metal at first but it didn't work," Phillips said.

But with a subsequent try, he discovered copper was a more suitable medium for his creations.

Deborah Hughes, the activities director at Shady Lawn Health and Rehabilitation entered his copper trees in the annual Mississippi Health Care Association Nursing Home convention arts and crafts competition, and he won first place.

After growing up as "sort of an orphan," Phillips graduated from the original Boys Town orphanage in Omaha, Nebraska, founded by the Roman Catholic priest Edward J. Flanagan in 1917.  Since, his travels have taken him all over the country.

Phillips said he was transferred to Vicksburg in 1980 from his company in Champagne, Illinois, and work at Anderson-Tully as director of labor relations until his retirement.

After discovering his talent for crafting trees, Phillips began branching out into other art forms.

"He has become a prolific painter," said Ron Whitmore, Phillips' son-in-law, who owns an art supply store in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

"It all started as a fluke," Whitmore said, when he and his wife started sending Phillips canvases, paint brushes and paint from their store.  

Whitmore said Phillips now paints every  day and sends a list of supplies when he runs short. Karen Whitmore, Phillips' daughter, also is an artist in Santa Fe.

To view Phillips' art, visit twodogstall.blogspot.com.  His trees are available for sale at The Old Court House Museum and at The Attic Gallery.
tfrazier@vicksburgpost.com