Portrait of Pittsburgh Artist in Poverty

The Jewish Chronicle, November 14, 2002
By Jo Marks Rifkin

History is rife with stories of artists going insane. Some say this insanity may be a part of an artist’s personality; others blame it on an artist’s poverty.

A new book about local Jewish artist Esther Phillips, who sold her work from a mental institution in the 1930s, begs the question.

Lisa Miles, a local author and musician, hopes her biography on Phillips, “This Fantastic Struggle: The Life and Art of Esther Phillips” will bring the deceased primitive/abstract artist acclaim.

“I also hope this changes the way the world looks at artists,” Miles said.

Artists without funds work harder than almost anyone, Miles said. Forced to work a regular job in order to live, they then can concentrate on their art in what spare time remains.

Miles, herself an artist, is a violinist who writes original music in collaboration with theater, film and movement artists.

She has published prose and poetry and, before working as a full-time artist, was a mental health professional at People’s Oakland , a social services agency for people with mental illness.

Miles said her artistic and mental health backgrounds afford her special insight into Phillips’ life.

Reared in Pittsburgh by a family that couldn’t appreciate her artistic identity, Phillips left for Greenwich Village in 1936 and never looked back.

Born in Russia and raised in the Hill District, she discovered her artistic abilities at the Irene Kaufmann Settlement, a haven for immigrants with its many academic and social programs. Having rejected a career as a teacher, a traditional job for women at that time, she studied briefly at Carnegie Tech then left for New York .

Despite early critical success, Phillips could not earn a living during the Depression.

“She was driven to a mental institution because of her destitution and under appreciation as an artist,” Miles said.

A patient at the Harlem Valley State Hospital in Wingdale , N.Y. , for six years, Phillips produced canvases portraying her other-worldly existence at the time. She made money at the institution by selling her artwork to friends in Pittsburgh and to former Carnegie Museum of art administrators from the 1920s through the 1950s.

It is unclear whether the works the administrators bought were for their private collections or for the museum, Miles said. There are none of Phillips’ pieces currently in the Carnegie’s collection.

Upon her release from the mental institution, Phillips returned to transient living in the Village, trying to earn a living as an artist and coping with a society that did not recognize her efforts.

“Esther’s story is told through innumerable primary source documents and dialogues, and of course, her work, which is shown extensively throughout ‘This Fantastic Struggle,” said Miles, who has been working on Phillips’ story for more than 10 years. Miles conducted interviews and discovered materials in New York and Pittsburgh .

She interviewed local Pittsburgh artists (now deceased) at numerous nursing homes, and discovered the Harlem Valley State Hospital documents and the artist’s correspondences.

“Letters between friends provide insight into Esther’s plight, the stark tragedy of tying to exist on nothing,” Miles said.

The biography also gives entertaining portraits of the lascivious Village and a peak into the inner relationships of the lucky few who reached fame as abstract expressionists and the many who did not.

Because Phillips frequently embellished stories, Miles was sometimes misled when collecting data.

For example, Phillips – who never married – told friends she was in a mental institute because she had married a homosexual who tried to kill her.

Phillips also told her New York acquaintances she was from Philadelphia , thinking Pittsburgh was too provincial for them.

“The artist’s few poignant reflections were almost lost among her many humorous anecdotes,” Miles said.

 In spite of her poverty and depression, Phillips seemed grateful for what she accomplished.

“I did exactly what I wanted in my life,” she once said. “I was happy I could paint.”