Allen & Unwin
Michael Leunig, cartoonist extraordinaire and philosopher loves Tasmania, he finds it ‘enchanting, and ‘with a unique flavour’ and singles out the ‘beautiful air, the human scale and the influence of the natural world that give it it’s unique identity’.
As an artist he is also an admirer of MONA and it’s world wide focus, illustrated by his encounter with some Bostonians when he visited. He found watching the crowd fascinating and the cafeteria a peaceful place. He agrees the conception of MONA was a ‘bold stroke’. You could also say that Michael himself has created his own characters with a bold stroke. His ‘Holy Fool’ (A non-conformist either because of his ‘mental disposition’ or because he chooses not to conform, but for all this has ‘a compensating divine blessing or inspiration’) gives his name to Michael’s latest book. As well as the Holy Fool for those familiar with his work, there is of course the duck!
Our talk turns the duck because of his sheer prominence in Michael’s work. Michael explains to me that ducks first appeared because he simply liked them and ‘a duck is a playful creature without hostility’ although later enlightenment told him perhaps there was subconsciously something more in his representation of these creatures.
Over time he has learned that in Thailand one of the many meanings of the word ‘duck’ is ‘clever’. Michael also points to the divinity and innocence about them. This idea of innocence is also prevalent in Michael’s thoughts and work as he explains we have forgotten how to be awake to childhood innocence and nature.
This shared innocence between children and ducks is illustrated in German Mythology an example being the fairytale of ‘Hansel and Gretel’ where the duck is a creature that helps the children through the forest when they are abandoned there. Interestingly, Michael says he was told the duck also has a hieroglyphic in Egyptian mythology.
In addition, the duck is a creature that walks on the ground, swims in water and can also take to the skies, in doing the latter it becomes a bridge between this world and the spirit one and so becomes a powerful symbol of spirituality.
During our philosophising I ask Michael about his thoughts on Morris Gleitzman’s idea of the magic spaces where author/creator meets the reader with the life experiences the reader/observer brings to a work of art and their interpretation of it. Michael says he welcomes his readers to interpret how they will but that sometimes it is not necessary to know.
One cartoon in his book pictures two figures, perhaps a father and son watching a beauty of nature on the television, an identical image replicated outside their window. Whether this cartoon is telling us that we are displacing nature for technology or whether it is commenting on the blissful ignorance or innocence of his characters and that perhaps we don’t really need to see the whole picture but be content to that which is transmitted to us. It’s enough that the world makes us ponder.
Michael enhances this idea in his talk of ‘the rich spaces’ alive with possibilities in the ‘negative capability’ and how in not knowing there can be joyous mystery. We ,however neglect this life of the spirit. Michael is enthused by life and sees it as ‘a rich blessing and a rich mystery’ of which art is a love offering.
The cartoons in this book certainly are a love offering.
Michael’s latest book collection ‘Holy Fool’ is out now published by Allen & Unwin.
What the Media Release says …
HOLY FOOL
Michael Leunig
Filled with his trademark lunacy, poignancy and arrow-to-the-heart wisdom, Holy Fool is a collection of more than 240 artworks by Australia’s most admired cartoonist.
At the heart of Michael Leunig’s work lies the idea of the holy fool — a character who does not conform to social norms of behaviour because of peculiar mental disposition or as a deliberate choice , but is regarded as having a compensating divine blessing or inspiration. It could be said that the holy fool is the protagonist in most of Michael’s paintings and cartoons.
As wonderful as his cartoons are, in Holy Fool we see so much more of the artistic expression of Michael Leunig — from drawings and paintings to prints and sculpture, collected together for the first time. Holy Fool is a must-have volume for the legion of art lovers and Leunig fans.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael Leunig is an Australian cartoonist, writer, painter, philosopher and poet. His commentary on political, cultural and emotional life, which spans more than forty years, has often explored the idea of an innocent and sacred personal world. The fragile ecosystem of human nature and its relationship to the wider natural world is a related and recurrent theme. His newspaper work appears regularly in the Melbourne Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. Leunig describes his approach as regressive, humorous, messy, mystical, primal and vaudevillian — producing work that is open to many interpretations. It has been widely adapted in education, music, theatre, psychotherapy and spiritual life.
PUBLISHED: November 2013
IMPRINT: Allen & Unwin
CATEGORY: ART
RRP: $49.99
