I find myself working on Gluttony for the Psychomachia series today. Gluttony is represented in a Biblical sense by the bite of the apple.  Thematically, gluttony is being represented by the sideshow freak “World’s Fattest Woman.”

My subject is the world’s fattest woman only metaphorically, of course.  And then I began to wonder how many women live as the world’s fattest woman everyday–wallowing in guilt over their own perceived Gluttony, often false or imagined.  I wonder.

Okay, I added a blog category today–Links I Love. I trip across them and have them sent to me all the time.  Here’s one that made me smile–the Alphabet Soup Work Generator.  Thanks to Toni Turbeville for this one.

Send me the links that YOU love!

–R.L. Gibson

Although I’m hard at work on Psychomachia with my friend Jerry Portelli, I can’t afford not to be showing work in the meantime.

I’m thinking about entering the notBig show in the Chicago Arts District.  All works must be 12″ or smaller–which means they are inexpensive to ship via Priority Mail Insured.  Plus, the entry fee is only $20 for up to 3 images. 

The call can be found at Art & Art Deadlines.com ; however, I have also re-posted the Call below.  The deadline is October 31st, 2009.  Hmmm…what should I enter?  Most of the Pieces of Me series is 12″x12″.  I’ll have to give it some thought.

SHOW: notBig: A Small Works Competition in the Chicago Arts District

ENTRY DEADLINE: October 31, 2009

EXHIBIT TYPE: Gallery Exhibit

MEDIA: This is an open call for any medium including painting, sculpture, ceramics, collage, mixed media, photography and glass.

DESCRIPTION: The Logsdon 1909 Gallery in Chicago, Illinois announces a call to artists for a juried show, December 11, 2009 to January 2, 2010, that is open to all individual artists working in the contemporary arts. $500 first. $200 for second. $100 for third. +Purchase Awards. Juror: Doug Stapleton. There is no intended theme for the work; it just needs to fit the criteria of being “small art”. No works over 12 inches in any direction. $20 for 3 images. Visit http://www.logsdongallery.jimdo.com for prospectus.

CONTACT: Marco Logsdon at logsdongallery@gmail.com or call 312-666-8966.

PSYCHOMACHIA (meaning Battle of Souls) is the newest series done in collaboration with Arizona-based artist Jerry Portelli. This work reinterprets the Seven Deadly Sins and the Seven Holy Virtues in a series of 14 diptychs, one from each artist. The aesthetic theme is the sideshow freak from the circus and fairs of yesteryear–nature’s artwork, if you will.

We seek to honor the sideshow freak as the masque form of the very best and very worst of humanity, regardless of individual morality. This work is wrapped in a celebration of the possibilities of digital media and rejects the pervasive sort of embarassment of digital alteration in photography. The use of square canvases in Psychomachia is meant to echo the pixel of which all digital images is comprised.

The work is ongoing as of October, 2009. I have been sworn to keep the images under wraps until the show opens; however, I think the Clown God will let just a puzzle-piece of two works (see below) out of the bag just for you.

“For years I have used the clown mask as a means by which the ordinary becomes the extraordarinary. However, in the Psychomachia series, I
was able to use the clown mask as masque of the common in favor of the extraordinary spirit of the human condition via the sideshow freak of yesteryear — both real and imagined. The Seven Deadly Sins & Seven Holy Virtues simply add a layer of unexpected judgement of intent to the physical reality.”

–Jerry Portelli, the Clown God

“My work habit is to explore the physical reality of my reverence for human potential with ‘self as other’ as reoccurring content. The Psychomachia series, challenged me to not rely on facial expression. While every face is unique, humanity regardless of culture or language recognizes facial expression as the key to discovering the true soul. Limiting use of the face allowed me to further explore the physcial uniqueness upon which the Seven Deadly Sins & Seven Holy Virtues provide the crux of judgement allowing acceptance of the physical.”

–R.L. Gibson, the Xerographist

Thank you for your patience while RLGibson.com was under construction!

In 2008, I was privileged to have PR Maven Toni Turbeville design and launch a beautiful website in promotion of my work as R.L. Gibson.  As always, Turbeville listened and responded to my desire for a simple, mono-chromatic site that gave the bare basics of my work and my statement in this world as an artist.

Here’s what the site used to look like:

Developments over the past year, including the launch of a new series Psychomachia with Arizona-based artist Jerry Portelli, the launch of a new art blog ArtAndArtDeadlines.com, and the requests from my peers and fans to offer current updates on the work coming out of my 42 square-foot studio–Well, they all resulted in this relaunch of my site in a format that allows you to leave comments, receive automated updates by email, and get a closer look at the work behind the work.

Welcome, I’m glad you’re here.  Take a minute and subscribe by email.

–R.L. Gibson