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Danica Phelps
USA, 1971

The work of Danica Phelps gathers conceptual precedents not only by taking in account economy as a main theme of her work but also in the own practice of the data capture, the exhaustiveness, and in the record of the facts, that have been a main feature of conceptual art.

Since 1996 Danica Phelps has been documenting all of her income and expenses through drawings in a system that becomes increasingly layered and complex. In this system, each drawing is a depiction of a daily activity and documentation of a financial transaction, and each dollar is represented by a single stripe of watercolor: green for income, red for expense and grey for credit.

The result is a huge personal diary, even if speaking of results is hard. First because the work is always in process, and second because the work in itself is almost not a work in itself but a tracing, a document of pieces of everyday life.

She has participated in the Whitney Museum Triennial and has exhibited at institutions such as the New Museum, Hammer Museum, Brooklyn Museum, Fundación La Caixa, and Folkwang Museum, among others.

Her works can be found in the collections of the Brooklyn Museum of Art, Arkansas Art Center, Daimler Art Collection, Farnsworth Museum, Hammer Museum, Magasin 3 Konsthall, Seattle Art Museum, University of New Mexico Art Museum, Wien Museum, Yale Art Museum, Fundación La Caixa, and Tang Teaching Museum.

 

 

 

Reach, Studio. 2024

Danica Phelps
4 Mortgages January 2024
2025
Pencil on paper
55 x 76 cm

3.200 € (VAT included)

 

Danica Phelps is aware of the passage of time and fully embraces it. However, she also acknowledges that her years of creating physically demanding works are diminishing. As part of this process, she has stopped mounting her drawings on plywood, as transporting such heavy materials has become too difficult. Last year, after receiving a cortisone injection in a shoulder that had been causing her pain for a long time, she felt a surge of inspiration. She decided to take advantage of her regained mobility to create large-scale works, pushing the limits of her body while she still could.

Her drawings had always been relatively small, but after the injection, she felt the urge to expand her reach, both physically and conceptually. At the same time, she has been restructuring her finances with the goal of generating greater income, as the constant lack of money has been a recurring struggle. To achieve this, she decided to use the equity in her home to acquire three additional properties for rental purposes.

These drawings represent the mortgages on those four properties. Each piece translates into lines the immense amount of money she owes to the bank—figures that would otherwise be difficult to grasp. Drawing them is a way of making them tangible. In each piece, Phelps places her pencil at the center of the paper and draws lines outward until she reaches her physical limit, repeating this process until the number of lines matches the amount of dollars owed.

The first two pieces contain approximately 250,000 lines each. These lines are so densely layered that they form a semicircle spanning from the horizon on her left to the horizon on her right. The accumulation is so intense that the paper has torn, creating holes that go through to the wall behind it. These tears became a new challenge, forcing her to work around them, just as her body must adapt to pain over time.

The drawings capture her limits: how far she can go, both financially and physically. They also encapsulate her effort, her reach. In each piece, Phelps introduces the maximum amount of work into the smallest imaginable space. These first two pieces, created simultaneously, took her approximately a year to complete. Two drawings in one year. Two sheets of paper and a pencil. No wasted materials.

The next two works form diptychs: one contains around 350,000 lines, and the other, 500,000. These pieces extend from floor to ceiling and span approximately 10 feet in width. Through this process, Danica Phelps continues to explore her own limits, finding meaning at the intersection of physical effort, financial burden, and the resilience of her body.

 

Danica Phelps
4 Mortgages 2024
2025
Pencil on paper
76 x 104 cm

3.200 € (VAT included)

 

 

 

 

 

Danica Phelps
Reach, Studio
2024
Pencil on paper
304 x 152 cm

 

 

 

Founding. 2022

 

Danica Phelps
July 26th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
101 x 55 cm

3.900 € (VAT included)

 

Time accumulates in moments that add up to the present, even if we do not remember the details or most of those moments. Each one is impossible without the previous one and carries all the others with it, shaping us in a way similar to the earth and its strata—millions of years of history piled on top of one another.

A child manifests more and more with each experience until the moment comes when they decide who they want to be. Founding traces this period in the life of the artist’s son through a journey across the Grand Canyon in Arizona. The drawings capture the way the artist sees her son grow, while the lines beneath each drawing document the expenses of the trip—gas, camping, car rental—everything carefully recorded.

If the lines representing the artist’s expenses and income are always vertical and have become a fundamental element of her practice, in this project, they turn horizontal, creating a visual parallel with the visible strata in the geological formations and the landscape.

 

 

Danica Phelps
July 24th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
116 x 55 cm

5.100 € (VAT included)

 

Danica Phelps
July 15th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
104 x 55 cm

 

Danica Phelps
August 16th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
87 x 55 cm

4.800  € (VAT included)

 

Danica Phelps
August 18th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
76 x 55 cm

4.200 € (VAT included)

 

Danica Phelps
August 2nd
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
91 x 55 cm

5.100 € (VAT included)

Danica Phelps
August 19th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
75 x 55 cm

5.000 € (VAT included)

 

Danica Phelps
August 9th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
104 x 55 cm

4.000 € (VAT included)

 

Danica Phelps
August 13th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
92 x 55 cm

5.100 € (VAT included)

 

 

Danica Phelps
July 23rd
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
78 x 55 cm

3.800 € (VAT included)

 

 

Danica Phelps
July 28th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
89 x 55 cm

3.800 € (VAT included)

 

 

 

Danica Phelps
August 1st
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
61 x 55 cm

5.000 € (VAT included)

 

 

Danica Phelps
August 11th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
78 x 55 cm

4.100 € (VAT included)

 

 

Danica Phelps
August 4th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
124 x 55 cm

4.900 € (VAT included)

 

Danica Phelps
August 5th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
124 x 55 cm

4.700 € (VAT included)

 

 

Danica Phelps
August 6th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
99 x 55 cm

4.800 € (VAT included)

 

 

Danica Phelps
July 30th
2022
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
98 x 56 cm

4.900 € (VAT included)

 

 

 

 

 

The Gratitude Project. 2017

 

Danica Phelps
The Gratitude Project, 23 (National Coalition for the Homeless)
2017
Drawing and watercolor on paper on wood
51 x 50 cm

2.300 € (VAT included)

 

“This project arises from the hours I spend, while drawing, listening to the BBC and NPR, hearing the terrible stories of thousands of refugees trying to escape terror and war in search of a safe life. My greatest skill is creating art, so I began auctioning my drawings through Facebook with no starting price, to raise money for organizations working to help.

This has evolved into a project that addresses all kinds of issues that are important to me. And now, with Donald Trump’s election as President of the United States, I feel there are domestic issues I would like to contribute to. Each drawing represents something from my life, and the recipient organization of that drawing’s auction is chosen to be paired with it in a meaningful way. The result of each transaction is a diptych that displays the work of each organization alongside the amount raised, in parallel with my daily life.”

Once again incorporating the role of art as a driver of change, Danica Phelps exposes her intimacy, this time establishing a connection between her inner world and external reality.

 

Danica Phelps
The Gratitude Project, 37 (Anti Difamation League)
2017
Drawing and acrylic on paper on wood
41 x 74 cm

2.300 € (VAT included)

 

 

Danica Phelps
The Gratitude Project, 28 (Halo Trust)
2017
Drawing and acrylic on paper on wood
52 x 65 cm

2.600 € (VAT included)

 

 

 

Danica Phelps
The cost of love
2011
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
152 x 66 cm

 

 

Danica Phelps
Income’s outcome
2013
Pencil, watercolor and gouache on paper
74 x 44 cm

 

 

Danica Phelps
June 2017
2017
Watercolor on paper
40 x 69,8 cm

3,000 USD

 

Danica Phelps
August 2017
2017
Watercolor on paper
40 x 76 cm

3,000 USD

 

Danica Phelps
July 2017
2017
Watercolor on paper
15 x 30 cm

3,000 USD

 

 

 

Danica Phelps
Making Love with Debi October 8
2004
Pencil on paper
22 x 30 cm

 

 

Danica Phelps
Making Love with Debi, December 31
2004
Pencil on paper
22 x 30 cm

 

 

Danica Phelps
Making Love with Debi, November 29
2004
Pencil on paper
30 x 22,7 cm

 

Danica Phelps
Making Love with Debi, September 27
2004
Pencil on paper
22.7 x 30.2 cm