Rick Gibson
Encyclopedia
Rick Gibson is a Canadian sculptor and artist. He was born in Montreal, Quebec and he studied Psychology at the University of Victoria
. Between 1973 and 1974 he drew weekly comics for the student newspaper. After completing his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1974 he moved to Vancouver, Canada. He lived in London, England from 1983 to 1989. He received a Master of Science degree in Interactive Art and Technology from SIAT
in 2004.
assistant for the American new media artist Al Razutis. In 1978 he received Canadian government funding to build his own holography studio and study holographic special effects. He exhibited the results of this work in Vancouver at the Helen Pitt Gallery in June 1978 and again in Victoria at the Open Space Gallery in June 1979.
The same works were later shown in November 1984 at the Cuts Gallery in London, England.
es from an anatomy professor. They were 10 weeks in development and had been dehydrated for 20 years. Gibson re-hydrated both foetuses, freeze-dried them and attached them as earring
s to a female mannequin head. The sculpture was titled Human Earrings. They were exhibited at the Young Unknowns Gallery in south London in December 1987. On Thursday, 3 December 1987, the sculpture was seized by the Metropolitan Police Service
. Because of this incident, Gibson was expelled from Goldsmiths College
on 21 December 1987, where he was studying post-graduate art, design and technology. On Monday, 11 April 1988, Gibson and the gallery owner, Peter Sylveire, were formally charged with the common law offences
of exhibiting a public nuisance and outraging public decency.
The trial started on Monday, 30 January 1989 at the Old Bailey
in central London. The judge was Brian Smedley
, Michael Worsley was the prosecuting barrister, and Geoffrey Robertson
and Francis Irwin were the defense barristers. On 6 February 1989, the charge of public nuisance was dismissed. On Tuesday, 9 February 1989, the jury of 10 women and 2 men found Gibson and Sylveire guilty of outraging public decency. Gibson was fined £500 and Sylveire was fined £300.
Immediately following the verdict, an appeal application was filed. However, on 10 July 1990, the Court of Appeal dismissed the case and upheld the earlier conviction.
There was considerable media commentary about this sculpture before, during, and after the trial. The court case was also the subject of a one-hour British television programme.
Since the trial, writers have continued to reflect on the sculpture and its social implications.
. He did his first performance piece in Reading, England on Saturday, 4 January 1986. He walked on the High Street
with a dog carrying a sign which said, “Wanted: legally preserved human limbs and human fetuses”. He tried to do the same piece again in Brighton, England on Saturday, 25 January 1986 but he was arrested and convicted of behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace
. Subsequent performance pieces included standing in front of the Director of Public Prosecutions
office in London, England with a live rat in front of his face, enabling people to kill live insects in Plymouth, England (where he was arrested but released without charge), wearing a vest made with live worms in London, England, and questioning the killing of slugs in Vancouver, Canada.
, he legally ate a canapé
of donated human tonsils in Walthamstow High Street, London, England. A year later, on Saturday, 15 April 1989, he publicly ate a slice of human testicle in Lewisham High Street, London, England. When he tried to eat another slice of human testicle at the Pitt International Galleries in Vancouver, Canada on 14 July 1989, the Vancouver police confiscated the testicle hors d'œuvre. However, the charge of publicly exhibiting a disgusting object was dropped and he finally ate the piece of human testicle on the steps of the Vancouver court house on 22 September 1989.
newspaper in Vancouver, Canada reported that Gibson intended to crush a rat named Sniffy between two paint canvasses with a 25 kilogram concrete block in downtown Vancouver. On impact, Sniffy would leave an imprint on the canvasses, forming a diptych
. Gibson said he had acquired Sniffy from a pet store which sold living rats as food for snakes and lizards. The performance was planned to happen on Saturday, 6 January 1990, outside of the old central public library on Burrard Street. Opinion about the impending event was publicly broadcast via newsprint, television, and radio.
On the morning of Saturday, 6 January 1990, a group of animal rights activists confiscated the device Gibson was going to use to crush the rat. Because of this development, Gibson arrived at the corner of Robson and Burrard at 1 PM without Sniffy or his art making device. He told a crowd of over 300 people that he had returned the rat to the pet store where he had rented it. He encouraged the crowd to go to the pet store and rescue Sniffy before it was sold as snake food. As he tried to leave the area, Gibson was surrounded by animal rights activists. He, along with Susan Milne and Paddy Ryan, were chased up Burrard Street by a mob. The three of them escaped through the Hotel Vancouver.
Later that day, Sniffy was purchased from the pet store by Peter Hamilton of the LifeForce Foundation.
Immediately afterwards, cartoonists,
writers,
editors, and the general public commented on the event. Numerous books have also made reference to it.
Several television shows have also focused on it. For the tenth anniversary of the performance, Radix Theatre, under the direction of Andrew Laurenson, created the Sniffy the Rat bus tour.
in the north of England. In 1992, he received funding from the British Columbia Ministry of Tourism to develop a similar project in the mountains near Vancouver. This project was carried out at the University of British Columbia Research Forest in Maple Ridge during the summer of 1992. After completing this project, he was hired as a curator for Artopolis ’93 in Vancouver. He managed the installation of fourteen site-specific installations in Stanley Park
during October and November 1993. Following Artropolis, he was commissioned by the City of Vancouver to design and build four community bird feeders on the Woodland Drive Bridge. Later, he worked with Ed Varney as a public art consultant for the City of Vancouver. They developed the first public art process for the new Vancouver Public Library
. Working closely with architect Moshe Safdie
, they managed the installation of the Joseph Montague fountain and they established a public art endowment fund. They also wrote the first public art policy for the Vancouver Park Board.
s. He exhibited some of these images at the 1995 Currents exhibition in Vancouver and in Victoria, BC. In 1996 he built the world’s first completely anaglyphic website Between 2002 and 2004 he studied 3D lenticular printing
for his Masters degree. By 2006 he was publicly showing autostereoscopic prints. In 2007 he had a major exhibition of this work at the 3D Center of Art and Photography
in Portland, Oregon. In February 2011 he exhibited six large lenticular prints at the Blim Gallery in Vancouver, Canada. These prints paid homage to six renowned religious leaders by revealing the penis of God within them.
University of Victoria
The University of Victoria, often referred to as UVic, is the second oldest public research university in British Columbia, Canada. It is a research intensive university located in Saanich and Oak Bay, about northeast of downtown Victoria. The University's annual enrollment is about 20,000 students...
. Between 1973 and 1974 he drew weekly comics for the student newspaper. After completing his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1974 he moved to Vancouver, Canada. He lived in London, England from 1983 to 1989. He received a Master of Science degree in Interactive Art and Technology from SIAT
SIAT
SIAT may refer to:* S.I.A.T. , the predecessor company of the Spanish car maker SEAT * Siebelwerke/ATG, a German aircraft manufacturer...
in 2004.
3D Holograms
In 1976, he became the holographyHolography
Holography is a technique that allows the light scattered from an object to be recorded and later reconstructed so that when an imaging system is placed in the reconstructed beam, an image of the object will be seen even when the object is no longer present...
assistant for the American new media artist Al Razutis. In 1978 he received Canadian government funding to build his own holography studio and study holographic special effects. He exhibited the results of this work in Vancouver at the Helen Pitt Gallery in June 1978 and again in Victoria at the Open Space Gallery in June 1979.
Freeze-Dried Sculpture
In an attempt to solve a holographic problem, he experimented with freeze-drying techniques. He produced a series of sculptures that explored the ethics of using legally embalmed animals and humans as art supplies. These sculptures were first exhibited at the Unit/Pitt Gallery in Vancouver, Canada in 1981.The same works were later shown in November 1984 at the Cuts Gallery in London, England.
Foetus Earrings
During the 1984 exhibition of freeze-dried sculptures in London, England, he was given two dehydrated human fetusFetus
A fetus is a developing mammal or other viviparous vertebrate after the embryonic stage and before birth.In humans, the fetal stage of prenatal development starts at the beginning of the 11th week in gestational age, which is the 9th week after fertilization.-Etymology and spelling variations:The...
es from an anatomy professor. They were 10 weeks in development and had been dehydrated for 20 years. Gibson re-hydrated both foetuses, freeze-dried them and attached them as earring
Earring
Common locations for piercings, other than the earlobe, include the rook, tragus, and across the helix . The simple term "ear piercing" usually refers to an earlobe piercing, whereas piercings in the upper part of the external ear are often referred to as "cartilage piercings"...
s to a female mannequin head. The sculpture was titled Human Earrings. They were exhibited at the Young Unknowns Gallery in south London in December 1987. On Thursday, 3 December 1987, the sculpture was seized by the Metropolitan Police Service
Metropolitan Police Service
The Metropolitan Police Service is the territorial police force responsible for Greater London, excluding the "square mile" of the City of London which is the responsibility of the City of London Police...
. Because of this incident, Gibson was expelled from Goldsmiths College
Goldsmiths College
Goldsmiths, University of London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom which specialises in the arts, humanities and social sciences, and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It was founded in 1891 as Goldsmiths' Technical and Recreative Institute...
on 21 December 1987, where he was studying post-graduate art, design and technology. On Monday, 11 April 1988, Gibson and the gallery owner, Peter Sylveire, were formally charged with the common law offences
Common law offences
Common law offences are crimes under English criminal law and the related criminal law of Commonwealth of Nations countries. These are offences of the common law which are developed entirely by the courts over the years, and for which there is no actual legislation.The various common law offences...
of exhibiting a public nuisance and outraging public decency.
The trial started on Monday, 30 January 1989 at the Old Bailey
Old Bailey
The Central Criminal Court in England and Wales, commonly known as the Old Bailey from the street in which it stands, is a court building in central London, one of a number of buildings housing the Crown Court...
in central London. The judge was Brian Smedley
Brian Smedley
Sir Frank Brian Smedley was a High Court judge in the Queen's Bench Division from 1995 to 2000. As a circuit judge, he took charge of the prosecution of the Matrix Churchill trial in 1992.- Early life :...
, Michael Worsley was the prosecuting barrister, and Geoffrey Robertson
Geoffrey Robertson
Geoffrey Ronald Robertson QC is an Australian-born human rights lawyer, academic, author and broadcaster. He holds dual Australian and British citizenship....
and Francis Irwin were the defense barristers. On 6 February 1989, the charge of public nuisance was dismissed. On Tuesday, 9 February 1989, the jury of 10 women and 2 men found Gibson and Sylveire guilty of outraging public decency. Gibson was fined £500 and Sylveire was fined £300.
Immediately following the verdict, an appeal application was filed. However, on 10 July 1990, the Court of Appeal dismissed the case and upheld the earlier conviction.
There was considerable media commentary about this sculpture before, during, and after the trial. The court case was also the subject of a one-hour British television programme.
Since the trial, writers have continued to reflect on the sculpture and its social implications.
Performance Art
While living in London, England, he met many performance artists at the Brixton Artists CollectiveBrixton Artists Collective
The Brixton Artists Collective took a short lease on an empty carpet shop in Atlantic Road, Brixton, London, in June 1983. The three arches were spacious if a little damp. They allowed huge shows to take place which were decided by an open collective of 20 to 50 people. The only membership...
. He did his first performance piece in Reading, England on Saturday, 4 January 1986. He walked on the High Street
High Street
High Street, or the High Street, is a metonym for the generic name of the primary business street of towns or cities, especially in the United Kingdom. It is usually a focal point for shops and retailers in city centres, and is most often used in reference to retailing...
with a dog carrying a sign which said, “Wanted: legally preserved human limbs and human fetuses”. He tried to do the same piece again in Brighton, England on Saturday, 25 January 1986 but he was arrested and convicted of behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace
Breach of the peace
Breach of the peace is a legal term used in constitutional law in English-speaking countries, and in a wider public order sense in Britain.-Constitutional law:...
. Subsequent performance pieces included standing in front of the Director of Public Prosecutions
Director of Public Prosecutions
The Director of Public Prosecutions is the officer charged with the prosecution of criminal offences in several criminal jurisdictions around the world...
office in London, England with a live rat in front of his face, enabling people to kill live insects in Plymouth, England (where he was arrested but released without charge), wearing a vest made with live worms in London, England, and questioning the killing of slugs in Vancouver, Canada.
Cannibalism
On Saturday, 23 July 1988 he became the first person in British history to legally eat the flesh of another person in public. Because England does not have a specific law against cannibalismCannibalism
Cannibalism is the act or practice of humans eating the flesh of other human beings. It is also called anthropophagy...
, he legally ate a canapé
Canapé
A canapé is a small, prepared and usually decorative food, held in the fingers and often eaten in one bite.- Details :...
of donated human tonsils in Walthamstow High Street, London, England. A year later, on Saturday, 15 April 1989, he publicly ate a slice of human testicle in Lewisham High Street, London, England. When he tried to eat another slice of human testicle at the Pitt International Galleries in Vancouver, Canada on 14 July 1989, the Vancouver police confiscated the testicle hors d'œuvre. However, the charge of publicly exhibiting a disgusting object was dropped and he finally ate the piece of human testicle on the steps of the Vancouver court house on 22 September 1989.
Sniffy the Rat
On the 28 December 1989, The ProvinceThe Province
The Province is a daily, tabloid format newspaper published in British Columbia by Postmedia. It has been a daily newspaper since 1898.According to a recent NADbank survey, The Provinces average weekday readership was 520,100, making it British Columbia's most read newspaper...
newspaper in Vancouver, Canada reported that Gibson intended to crush a rat named Sniffy between two paint canvasses with a 25 kilogram concrete block in downtown Vancouver. On impact, Sniffy would leave an imprint on the canvasses, forming a diptych
Diptych
A diptych di "two" + ptychē "fold") is any object with two flat plates attached at a hinge. Devices of this form were quite popular in the ancient world, wax tablets being coated with wax on inner faces, for recording notes and for measuring time and direction.In Late Antiquity, ivory diptychs with...
. Gibson said he had acquired Sniffy from a pet store which sold living rats as food for snakes and lizards. The performance was planned to happen on Saturday, 6 January 1990, outside of the old central public library on Burrard Street. Opinion about the impending event was publicly broadcast via newsprint, television, and radio.
On the morning of Saturday, 6 January 1990, a group of animal rights activists confiscated the device Gibson was going to use to crush the rat. Because of this development, Gibson arrived at the corner of Robson and Burrard at 1 PM without Sniffy or his art making device. He told a crowd of over 300 people that he had returned the rat to the pet store where he had rented it. He encouraged the crowd to go to the pet store and rescue Sniffy before it was sold as snake food. As he tried to leave the area, Gibson was surrounded by animal rights activists. He, along with Susan Milne and Paddy Ryan, were chased up Burrard Street by a mob. The three of them escaped through the Hotel Vancouver.
Later that day, Sniffy was purchased from the pet store by Peter Hamilton of the LifeForce Foundation.
Immediately afterwards, cartoonists,
writers,
editors, and the general public commented on the event. Numerous books have also made reference to it.
Several television shows have also focused on it. For the tenth anniversary of the performance, Radix Theatre, under the direction of Andrew Laurenson, created the Sniffy the Rat bus tour.
Outdoor Installations
While living in London, Gibson visited the Grizedale ForestGrizedale Forest
Grizedale Forest is a 24.47 km² area of woodland in the Lake District of North West England, located to the east of Coniston Water and to the south of Hawkshead. It comprises a number of hills, small tarns and the settlements of Grizedale and Satterthwaite...
in the north of England. In 1992, he received funding from the British Columbia Ministry of Tourism to develop a similar project in the mountains near Vancouver. This project was carried out at the University of British Columbia Research Forest in Maple Ridge during the summer of 1992. After completing this project, he was hired as a curator for Artopolis ’93 in Vancouver. He managed the installation of fourteen site-specific installations in Stanley Park
Stanley Park
Stanley Park is a 404.9 hectare urban park bordering downtown Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It was opened in 1888 by David Oppenheimer in the name of Lord Stanley of Preston, the Governor-General of Canada....
during October and November 1993. Following Artropolis, he was commissioned by the City of Vancouver to design and build four community bird feeders on the Woodland Drive Bridge. Later, he worked with Ed Varney as a public art consultant for the City of Vancouver. They developed the first public art process for the new Vancouver Public Library
Vancouver Public Library
The Vancouver Public Library is the third largest public library system in Canada, with more than 2.5 million items in its collections, 22 branches, approximately 375,000 cardholders, and nearly nine million item borrowings annually...
. Working closely with architect Moshe Safdie
Moshe Safdie
Moshe Safdie, CC, FAIA is an architect, urban designer, educator, theorist, and author. Born in the city of Haifa, then Palestine and now Israel, he moved with his family to Montreal, Canada, when he was 15 years old.-Career:...
, they managed the installation of the Joseph Montague fountain and they established a public art endowment fund. They also wrote the first public art policy for the Vancouver Park Board.
3D Computer Graphics
In 1996 he received a research position at the Centre for Image and Sound Research at Simon Fraser University to study anaglyph imageAnaglyph image
Anaglyph images are used to provide a stereoscopic 3D effect, when viewed with glasses where the two lenses are different colors, such as red and cyan. Images are made up of two color layers, superimposed, but offset with respect to each other to produce a depth effect...
s. He exhibited some of these images at the 1995 Currents exhibition in Vancouver and in Victoria, BC. In 1996 he built the world’s first completely anaglyphic website Between 2002 and 2004 he studied 3D lenticular printing
Lenticular printing
Lenticular printing is a technology in which a lenticular lens is used to produce images with an illusion of depth, or the ability to change or move as the image is viewed from different angles...
for his Masters degree. By 2006 he was publicly showing autostereoscopic prints. In 2007 he had a major exhibition of this work at the 3D Center of Art and Photography
3D Center of Art and Photography
The 3D Center of Art and Photography is an American nonprofit educational institution in Portland, Oregon that opened in 2003. It is the first museum in the United States dedicated to stereoscopy. The Center is currently located in a leased storefront on NW Lovejoy Street on the Portland Streetcar...
in Portland, Oregon. In February 2011 he exhibited six large lenticular prints at the Blim Gallery in Vancouver, Canada. These prints paid homage to six renowned religious leaders by revealing the penis of God within them.