Brought to Light Australian Art 1850-1965

in Australian art, while in Sydney there was a plethora of exhibitions that sought to promote various non-figurative tendencies. Leonard French's art in the late 1950s and early 1960s occupied a curious middle ground in the arguments over figurative and abstract art. In a sense both camps felt comfortable with his work, yet neither the figurative artists nor the abstract ones adopted him as their own.The artist himself, by nature, was not a joiner — sociable, garrulous and a brilliant raconteur, his natural circle was the Swanston family pub, a 'watering hole' for left-wing Melbourne intellectuals, rather than any art society. In his paintings, his repertoire of emblematic shapes and symbols, flat two-dimensional surfaces with sharply demarcated forms, brilliant luminous colours which had no descriptive literal value, all allied his art with the abstract push in Australian art, yet his constant use of implied narrative and the preoccupation with myth and meaning securely anchored his practice within figurative Modernism. Within that generation of artists who employed abstract or abstracted elements in their art and who rose to prominence in Australian art in the 1950s, including Roger Kemp, John Cobum, William Rose, Tony Tuckson, Stan deTeliga, Leonard Crawford, George Johnson and James Meldrum, Leonard French was the one who received widest acclaim. Leonard French's public recognition took several different forms. In the 1960s, Australian art critics including Alan McCulloch, James Gleeson, Bernard Smith, Elwyn Lynn and Patrick McCaughey all praised his work. Art competitions, which by the 1960s had become increasingly important in the successful promotion of an Australian artist's reputation, were also frequently awarded to Leonard French and a number of major public commissions came his way.13 By the 1960s, Leonard French was one of the most highly acclaimed Australian artists of his day. He was represented in all the major Australian state and national art collections, as well as in a number of major international collections, and had been awarded an OBE for services to the arts. Even more significantly, he enjoyed great popular success. Like his older Left Leonard French The Garden 1960 Enamel on canvas on hardboard 202.5x183cm The Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney Leonard French Death in the Garden 1960 Enamel paint on hessian on composition board 203.5x183.5 cm Purchased 1960 National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne Leonard French The Burial 1960 OH, enamel, synthetic polymer resin, gold leaf on canvas mounted on board 152.5x183cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra European contemporary, Fernand Léger, Leonard French occupied a middle ground in the art spectrum. His work was intended as popular art for a mass audience, and, at the same time, it was conceived as an art worthy of museums. Like Léger, Leonard French frequently worked on a monumental scale and he shared Léger's philosophy of bringing art into life: Making contact between the people and the work of art is a problem that is in the air, everywhere; but in order to be able to talk to the people, you must be close to them. Very few of us are close to them.14 Leonard French was bom in 1928 into a working-class family in the Melbourne industrial suburb of Brunswick. A pride in his working-class origins and the desire to make his work accessible to a broad cross- section of society are two features that have remained constant in his philosophy. Taking upon himself the role of an artist emerging from the ranks of the working masses, Leonard French to some extent set himself the conscious task of producing an art that was relevant and accessible, yet one that was conscious of the heritage of modem art and contemporary culture. Léger, late in life, wrote: the people ... have created a language, a slang which is authentic poetry [the middle class has never invented a word of slang]. As for our painting, it too is slang, but it has no connection with the other.15 In Autumn in the Garden, Leonard French takes up this specific challenge of creating an authentic poetry which has its roots in various art traditions — Celtic, Pre- Columbian, Byzantine, Romanesque and Black African. Imbued with a sense of ritual and magic, its dazzling gem-like surface relates a tale of death and rebirth; from an enchanted chalice, set within a secret garden, a miracle of love appears. Dr Sasha Grishin is a Reader in Art History at the Australian National University, Canberra. AUTUMN IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN 279