Leonard Rosoman b.1913
The Dandy
oil on canvas
15 x 17 ins
signed lower right 'Leonard Rosoman'

Provenance
Bunny Rogers



According to the artist, the inspiration for this painting (dating from the mid/late 50s) came from a William Sansom short-story in which the narrator, walking through some fields and woods is confronted by a dandified figure whom he watches with interest as he walks slowly by, aware, at the same time, of the dark, sinister figures that are following him at a distance. Eventually they move on and disappear while the narrator, returning home, discovers that the figures were from the local mental hospital. As a painter Rosoman has always had a fascination for subjects which showed people in recognisable contained worlds, both physical and emotional; whether of his wartime experiences of the confined, tension-filled life aboard an ‘on-duty’ aircraft carrier, his paintings of people in lifts, workmen hanging from the cradles of New York skyscrapers or, as here, the implied confines of a mental institution. For these are the stages, if you like, for those ambiguous dramas or confrontations he is so intrigued by as an artist in which Rosoman explores so subtly feelings or passions subordinated or covered up in some way, whether erotic, social or criminal. Rosoman is one of the most undervalued artists of his generation, the cool impassivity of his line and acerbic colour sense picking up the beats of suppressed, often claustrophobic emotion like a volcanic seismometer, and producing an image which, in the case of The Dandy, is far removed from any attempt at illustrating its literary starting point becoming, as he himself puts it, 'Something that must be felt with the senses'.