John Gibbon

Microtonal Theorist and Bell Garden Creator

(b1930-07-02 – d1989)
Met Jonathan Glasier in 1978 at the first EFNIR (CME. UCSD). He brought a portable Bell Garden to the event.

Personal Recollection of John Gibbon by Jonathan Glasier

I met John in the Spring of 1979 at the Exhibition/Festival of New Instrumental Resources which was co-sponsored by Interval Foundation and UCSD’s Center For Music Experiment. John brought a selection of hanging metal (Bell Garden). Also at the time I met John, he was working with microtonal theory using polar maps to plot just intonation scales. His dream was to be able to microtonally identify the elements in this Bell Garden. John did not play a conventional musical instrument, but he wanted to play music. The result of this yearning and his talent in sorting which he had honed through his business of collecting and selling crystals and minerals, brought him to metal recycling and antique stores to find interesting metal for his Bell Garden. John continued to hone this craft until the end of his life. I believe that the art of sorting and sifting through what ever he was interested in was the engine of his creative and curios mind.

Born on July 2nd 1930, John was an Irishman who went to Trinity College and studied film and photography. In his twenties he was sent to Argentina, by the Shell Corporation to direct films for them. It was at that time that he became interested in crystal quartz minerals and their polyhedral morphology. John immigrated to the USA in the 60s and lived in Carmel and Los Angeles at different times. At each of these properties he would gather Bell Garden materials from where ever he could and invite people to participate in his social gatherings which would always include playing the Bell Garden and observing and discussing crystals. John became known as the Crystal Wizard because of his love for the information that they imbued. He was always studying and searching for patterns in the geometry of crystals and this led to other sorting endeavors such as pattern recognition in fabric and men’s ties. John was deeply studying and creating art objects that reflected his knowledge in Hexagonal Geometry. He created both two and three dimensional objects to study this work. His Googleplex ™ plastic geometric constructions work was exhibited at the Hollywood Bowl Museum in 1992. Later he created 2D artworks mostly based on his hexagonal geometric studies, These were metal grids which were his “canvass” for placing rivets, buttons and baubles of different sizes to outline geometric patterns on the perforated grids.

In 1989 and 1990, John and I co-sponsored the Conference for Microtonal Music and Polyhedra in the White Mountains area of Arizona (see video). We brought people from all over who were interested in Microtonal Music and Polyhedra to this special camp ground. This was a gesture to announce that the subjects of polyhedral forms and microtonality will forever be intertwined

Also in the early 2010s John connected with the Process Museum in Tucson Arizona. Directed by John Wells, the Process Museum is a sprawling one-story edifice that used to be owned by the Anaconda Mining Corp. Now it’s dual purpose in to house Wells’ medical manufacturing business and a museum of living artists and their work. John and I hauled much of his metal Bell Garden work to the Museum and after we had spent a week hanging it up, much of it was stolen by scrappers who ultimately returned it from which it came. It was quite a blow and the reality of hanging metal outside without proper security would probably not be possibility with the higher value of scrap metal.

The different places where John lived were always interesting and special gathering places. His place off of Big Tujunga Canyon road was a beautiful large cabin off a creek where John lived when I first met him in 1979. Later (1987) he met his wife, Ariyana, an artist and close friend and they were married in 1989.Unfortunately, that place burnt to the ground in 1994 and they moved to other places, La Crescenta and a former Scout camp in Tujunga. Each place was made a bit magical by John’s crystals and Bell Garden and Ariyana’s special art works.

Both John and Ariyana Gibbon always created special environments which drew interesting creative thinkers and artists to their celebrations. John was active until the end of his life, planning an art show which featured the geometric designs of men’s ties. John will be forever remembered by his friends as a master conversationalist and artist who was constantly searching and sorting to discover the beauty and patterns of life and science.