Denis Ray Phillips was born in Salt Lake City, Utah in 1938.  Phillips paints both abstract and realistic works; along with his wife, Bonnie Phillips, he is a co-owner of the Phillips Gallery, a long-time and successful art gallery in Salt Lake City.  He lives in Salt Lake.

Phillips received his BFA in painting and drawing from the University of Utah where LeConte Stewart was a major influence on his work in 1962.  Initially, he began to  paint in a formal tonalist style portraying the Utah landscape, but later in his career he also became known for his nonrepresentational work.  Near St. Charles Idaho (1974) is an example of his landscape work and Abstract Expressionism (1966), part of the Springville Museum of Art permanent collection, is an example of his nonrepresentational work.

Phillips’s work is in the permanent collections of Utah Museum of Fine Arts (Olpin Union Collection) and in the LDS Museum of Art.

Biographical information on this page was adapted from the Springville Museum of Art.