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.

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.

Just a short note to let you know you can see Pieces of Me: Fat (pictured left) in the Metropolitan Knoxville Airport.  514 entries from 120 artists were received, and 41 pieces were selected for the show.  To see all the pieces in the show, view the visit the Arts & Culture Alliance .

The Metropolitan Knoxville Airport Authority (McGhee Tyson Airport) and the Arts & Culture Alliance of Greater Knoxville are pleased to present “Arts in the Airport”, a new exhibition featuring selected artwork. “Arts in the Airport” was developed to allow regional artists to compete and display work in the most visited site in the area.

The selected art features contemporary 2-dimensional artwork and will be exhibited in the secured area behind McGhee Tyson Airport’s security gate checkpoint from November 5, 2009 – April 22, 2010.

This call for entry was featured on ArtAndArtDeadlines.com and had NO ENTRY FEE!  Get to work–No excuses!

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

“Pieces of Me began when I moved to Gatlinburg in 2007. In a bid to simplify our lives, my husband Jon, my son Oscar and I decided to write a list of places we wanted to live. At the top of the list was Paducah, KY because of the Artist Relocation Program, Nashville because of the vibrant downtown music scene, and Gatlinburg for the beauty of the Great Smoky Mountains. We visited each town, and for many reasons (none of which should diminish the loveliness of the losers), Gatlinburg won.

“We moved to a tiny 900 square foot, furnished ski chalet on top of a mountain. Bought a 4-wheel drive and sold almost everything else we owned. My husband went to work as an art gallery consultant immediately, and I stayed home with my then 8-year-old son for the duration of the summer.

“We took the theme ‘simplify our lives’ to the extreme that summer: 1 car…no cable…no telephone. Despite not being overly domestic, I found myself stranded on the top of a Tennessee mountain in a tiny house with nothing to do and no way to leave. The only thing we didn’t sell were all things artistic. How did we entertain ourselves? A bag of theatrical gray-scale makeup, great costume accessories, the trusty Olympus Digital Camera, and remote shutter release. Sue. Sally. Sara was one of the first pieces in the series (see below).

“Having spent years manipulating the Xerography technique originally taught to me by SC artist Kim LeMasters, Pieces of Me was born. And, while I have done lots of other work since that time, I’m still adding to the series. Enjoy a selection of work from Pieces of Me by clicking on the slideshow below; please note there is some nudity. I hope you love them. They feature the commonly used vehicle of self as other as a salute to my reverence for human potential.” –R.L. Gibson