French, Leonard (1928-2017), was an Australian painter known for his murals of epic themes. He first came to public notice in the 1950’s with a series of symbolic works using house paints. His themes were heroic and included the ancient Greek epics the Iliad and the Odyssey, and the Biblical Book of Genesis. Many of his themes included religious and literary imagery. His style featured vivid colors and geometric, flat forms that were sometimes semiabstract in appearance. French developed his style from studies of the modern French painters Fernand Leger and Robert Delauney as well as early Celtic art. French also designed stained glass, and he gained wide recognition for his monumental stained glass ceiling in the Great Hall of the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia.
French was born in the Melbourne suburb of Brunswick on Oct. 10, 1928. He became a sign writer’s apprentice at the age of 14, an experience reflected in his later large-scale, monumental wallpaintings. He studied painting at Melbourne Technical College from 1944 to 1947. French’s first commission was two frescoes for a church in Brunswick in 1948 that showed the influence of the Mexican mural painters Jose Clemente Orozco and Diego Rivera. French also made etchings and lithographs based on the themes of his paintings. He died on Jan. 10, 2017.
