Double Visions

Comments (0) By Benjamin Leatherman Thursday, Mar 31 2011

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Although renowned egghead Carl Jung may have been something of a bore and blowhard (and quite possibly a Nazi sympathizer), his contributions to modern psychology are unquestionable. Chief among them is the notion of mankind’s dual nature.

For those of you who slept through Psych 101, here’s the skinny: Within every human exists the possibility for both good and evil behavior, which explains why everyone from Lindsay Lohan to Muammar Gaddafi can be naughty one moment and nice the next.

The potential for both virtue and vice is explored in lurid and lascivious detail in Jerry Portelli and R.L. Gibson’s exhibition “Psychomachia,” opening with an artist’s reception on Friday, April 1, at Perihelion Arts, 610 East Roosevelt Street. The pair collaborated on more than a dozen unique photographic diptychs, each depicting old-timey circus performers in provocative poses and illustrating the seven deadly sins and seven holy virtues.

“We seek to honor the sideshow freak as the masque form of the very best and very worst of humanity, regardless of individual morality,” Gibson says.

Fri., April 1, 6-11 p.m.; Fri., April 15, 6-10 p.m., 2011