Philip Gips


Philip Sheldon Gips was an American graphic designer, known for his film posters.

Biography

Gips was born on March 28, 1931, in the Bronx, to Murray Gips and Rose Gips. He drew throughout his childhood. He graduated from the Cooper Union, in addition to the Yale School of Art. In 1958, he married copywriter Barbara Gips.
While attending Yale, he served as art director of Monocle, a magazine, alongside Lou Klein. For two years, he also served as art director for Time Life. He and Klein worked with Monocle until the early 1960s, with them founding an advertising firm. In 1968, he cofounded Gips Balkind – later Frankfurt Gips Balkind, when Stephen Frankfurt joined in 1988. Frankfurt was previously an executive of Young & Rubicam, and during that time, had requested Gips create film posters. Throughout his career, the film posters he created include:
  • Rosemary's Baby
  • Catch-22
  • Emmanuelle
  • That's Entertainment
  • Tommy
  • The Front
  • Network
  • Superman
  • Alien
  • All That Jazz
  • Kramer vs. Kramer
  • Absence of Malice
  • Arthur
  • The Verdict
  • Desperately Seeking Susan
  • Hoosiers
  • Fatal Attraction
  • No Way Out
  • Casualties of War
Alien, Downhill Racer, and Rosemary's Baby were voted to Premiere's 50 Best Movie Posters of All Time list in 2001. The poster for Emmanuelle is hung in the Museum of Modern Art, as well as his 1973 lithograph Imported From Sweden. Imported From Sweden; another work, the poster Tumba, had also been displayed in 1983.
He sometimes collaborated with his wife Barbara, who wrote taglines. Gips also created the logos for 38 Special, A&E, ESPN, and History Channel. In 2007, he retired. He had five children, including filmmaker Archie Gips. He and his family cameoed in Archie's films Loveless in Los Angeles and Chloe & Keith's Wedding. He died on October 3, 2019, aged 88, in White Plains, New York, from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and pneumonia. He was buried at Kensico Cemetery, in Valhalla, New York.