RPM: The Lost Art of LP Covers
June/July 2012; February/March 2011; May/June 2010;
April 2009; February/March 2008; March 2007, August 2005
Remember the LP cover? Two square feet of eye-popping, groin-stirring, world-rocking graphics, titles and liner notes rolled into one precisely measured object of desire?
In 1997, Deluge Contemporary inaugurated a series of fundraising exhibitions that spanned 15 years, collectively called RPM: The Lost Art of LP Covers.
Featuring the work of hundreds of emerging and established artists from from the regional, national and international scenes, RPM offered these extraordinary genre-defying interpretations for sale at the very affordable and egalitarian price of $33 then $45 each. Artists appreciated the ability to work outside of their oeuvres in support of the organization, and the pieces themselves were so sought after that these same artists—whose participation afforded them first dibs with a preview ahead of the general public—often constituted the bulk of buyers. For many people in the region—some of them children—RPM allowed them to purchase art for the first time, returning annually to add to their collections. Less a wildly successful money-maker in dollar amounts than a very popular community-building exercise for the visual arts in Victoria, Deluge saw the idea adapted and shared via similar exhibitions throughout the art world at large, leaving a colourful and expansive legacy when the concept was retired in 2012.