Valerie Phillips: Don’t Be Pretty

There’s something resistant about Valerie Phillips’ sculptures—the way they seem designed to reject easy consumption, to push back against being turned into decoration. Aluminum and steel and awkward angles, nothing soft, nothing that lets you rest your eye on it for long. The title says it plainly: this isn’t about seduction or elegance. It’s about making something that doesn’t apologize for taking up space in an ugly way.