Phillips was born in London in 1937. He read English at St. Catherine's College, Oxford (1957-60), at the same time attending drawing classes at the Ruskin School. He then studied at Camberwell School of Art (1961-64), his chief source of inspiration being Frank Auerbach. On graduating he taught at Bath Academy of Art, Ipswich School of Art, and Wolverhampton Art College between 1965 and 1972.
Phillips is very much the polymath. His artistic practice ranges from portraiture and other forms of painting to drawing and printmaking. He also composes, performs music and makes records. He is an essayist and curator, has published books, made films, sculpture and photographs and designed sets for the theatre. In all of his activities he delves deeply, looking at his subject from every angle, probing and pushing ideas to their limits.
His first solo exhibition was at the Artists International Association Gallery, London, in 1965. He won the John Moores Liverpool Exhibition Prize (1969) and went on to show in many solo and group exhibitions throughout Britain and abroad. His major works include 'A Humument', a series of drawings on the pages of a nineteenth-century novel, A Human Document by William Hurrell Mallock, that was published in 1892. Phillips selected certain words on each page, made drawings around them and created his own illustrated story. The drawings were exhibited in their entirety at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, in 1973. Thames & Hudson published the book A Humument in 1980. Other landmark exhibitions include a retrospective at the Kunsthalle, Basel, in 1975 and shows at the National Portrait Gallery in 1989 and the Royal Academy of Arts in 1993. Retrospectives celebrating his 60th birthday in 1997 were held at the Dulwich Picture Gallery and South London Gallery, both of which are close to his home in south London. An exhibition of his drawings was mounted at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, USA, in 2001.
Tom Phillips was Vice-Chair of the Copyright Council (1985-89) and is a Trustee of both the National Portrait Gallery (since 1998) and the British Museum (since 1999). He was elected Royal Academician in 1989.