ARTIST Jay McPhillips has a coffee problem. Even though he quit the addictive brew five years ago and switched to tea, Mr. McPhillips’ hasn’t fully recovered. In his portfolio of impressionist-style works, one will find many lovingly rendered paintings of coffee shops: Coffee & Cream and the former Bucks County Coffee Company, both in Doylestown, Pa., Lambertville Trading Company and Small World Coffee, a Princeton staple.

   Mr. McPhillips’ current art exhibition has nothing to do with coffee, but to see it, you’ll have to stop by Small World’s Nassau Street location. “Art Minis,” a series of small original paintings bundled in Pop Art-style packaging, will be on view through Dec. 1. Approximately 4-by-6 inches, the bagged and tagged paintings mostly reference familiar works of art. Others feature original local scenes by Mr. McPhillips.

   The tag on each package reads “Compare To:” with the “name brand” artist scrawled in red, in a parody of generic store brand products. The acrylics on canvas are divided into three categories: Pennsylvania Impressionist, Modern and Awesome. Artists Mr. McPhillips echoes in the Minis, which cost between $19.99 and $89.99, include Fern Coppedge, Pablo Picasso, William Langson Lathrop, Roy Lichtenstein, Jackson Pollock, Andy Warhol, Daniel Garber, Mark Rothko and Edgar Degas.

   While some who purchase the Minis choose to keep the paintings in the bag, others opt to take them out of the packaging to frame and display. (Mr. McPhillips recommends purchasing two, one for each purpose.) The most popular sellers have been those in the style of Pollock.

   When the country went into recession last year, Mr. McPhillips noticed that many painters in his Lambertville community began working smaller. He wanted to devise a way to work small while keeping it fun, and the Art Minis concept emerged.

   ”I’m torn between humor and elegant paintings,” says Mr. McPhillips, who now lives in Doylestown, Pa. “This kind of combines the two.”

   Mr. McPhillips doesn’t find a conflict in selling works on both ends of the spectrum, whether it’s a $2,000 oil painting on canvas or a $25 “doodle” book. He enjoys creating a wide variety of art, and hopes it makes him stand out among the thousands of landscape painters in the area.

   Mr. McPhillips’ affinity for the impressionist style grew stronger in 2004, when he had his first solo show at Riverrun Gallery in Lambertville. “As I started doing it, I realized I really enjoyed painting in the impressionist style,” he says. Titled New Developments in Painting, the exhibit featured works that juxtaposed lush landscapes with Bucks County construction sites.

   Past exhibits also include an ongoing Pop Art display at the recently closed ARTisZEN Arts and a show of more than 20 Newsstand Portraits at Myles Cavanaugh Fine Art in Lambertville. In addition to his current Art Minis show, Mr. McPhillips has more formal, full-size impressionist paintings on view at Chapman Gallery in Doylestown.

   Other recent projects by Mr. McPhillips include a self-published humor book, Staff Pick (available at lulu.com), featuring comics and short stories. The cover has a photo of a hitchhiker holding sacks of stolen money, trying to thumb a ride. The face is covered up by a circle that says “Staff Pick,” poking fun at the stickers bookstore employees use to mark their favorites.

   Mr. McPhillips also released a 2010 calendar with his original paintings of Doylestown and other Bucks County area scenes. These include Fonthill Museum, the “mayor” of Oakland Avenue (a furry cat), wooded paths and pro cyclists zipping by.

   Area residents might be most familiar with Mr. McPhillips’ work because of his cheeky bumper stickers and T-shirts. Skate shop Decked on Witherspoon Street carries his Princeton design, a pictogram puzzle with the iconic image of musician Prince. He also designed pictograms for Lambertville (a lamb, Sesame Street character Bert, followed by VILLE) and Bucks County (the word Bucks, followed by an image of Sesame Street’s “The Count” and a cup of tea).

   After graduating from the University of Delaware with a degree in visual communications, Mr. McPhillips became an ad director with Chiat/Day TBWA Advertising in New York for three years. He then moved to Portland, Maine, to study painting at the Maine College of Art and freelance as a graphic designer, and later Portland, Ore., for ad agency work and painting. Once he returned to the mid-Atlantic region, Mr. McPhillips worked for three years as an advertising creative for the cable television network Comedy Central in New York, commuting from Lambertville. He then found a job closer to home as McCarter Theatre’s graphic designer, where he worked for five years. Mr. McPhillips subsequently returned to painting and freelance design work.

   Of all of the artists he pays homage to in his Art Minis, Mr. McPhillips’ favorite is Pennsylvania Impressionist Lathrop, for his moody, emotional quality. A friend of Mr. McPhillips is an ancestor of Lathrop, the founder of the New Hope art colony. He hopes this connection will bring him one step closer to owning a Lathrop original. “I’ve asked my friend if he’s willing to trade one of mine for one of his,” Mr. McPhillips says, laughing. “Maybe he’ll come around.”

Jay McPhillips’ Art Minis are on view at Small World Coffee, 254 Nassau St., through Dec. 1. 609-924-4377; www.smallworldcoffee.com; www.jaymcphillips.com