Ron Francis SCOTT LIVESEY GALLERIES 1
AN ALTERNATE VIEW You glance out the window and you know something isn’t quite right. The clouds are far too low and the animals are spooked. No, the animals are downright terrified. And you realise, without actually thinking about it, you’ve squeezed up against the wall, afraid to be seen, hiding from something that strikes fear into your heart. You’re hiding from a few floating cumulus clouds. Why? Why indeed. This is Ron Francis’ world, a place where nothing can be taken for granted, a place where expectations are forever thwarted, where there is no correct response beyond a wry and nervous smile, an uncomfortable silent laugh, an attempt by the logical side of the brain to make sense of these detailed narratives. An unsuspecting suburban shopper crosses the path of a moment of devout prayer, revellers are served wine in a life-boat, the water around them strangely becalmed. Clive sits in a deck chair reading the morning paper, unperturbed by the fact that he sits amidst a featureless, seemingly endless, expanse. Even when things seem comparatively normal, as in Memories of Nielson Park, something still feels amiss until, indeed, we recognise this as exactly what its’ title states – this is a memory. A perfectly rendered memory, a reminisce of times past, a memory we all have of salty days with nary a blemish... except for the fact that they lie in the past until, like some kind of Resurrectionist, Ron Francis conjures them up replete with the melancholia of days past. It is not hard to imagine that Francis himself features in this painting, sitting on the sand just beyond the picture frame, his family on the beach. Even Dad is rendered with a mixed sense of nostalgia. Viewed from a child’s perspective he is a looming figure, his shadow falling ominously over the doorway, his tie askew, a portrait of exhaustion hulking over a toy wooden train, the kitchen Spartan, a joyless portrait rendered with nervous love. 2
At times Francis unearths elements of what Sigmund Freud discussed in his 1919 essay, The Uncanny: “The subject of the ‘uncanny’... is undoubtedly related to what is frightening — to what arouses dread and horror; equally certainly, too, the word is not always used in a clearly definable sense, so that it tends to coincide with what excites fear in general. Yet we may expect that a special core of feeling is present which justifies the use of a special conceptual term. One is curious to know what this common core is which allows us to distinguish as ‘uncanny’; certain things which lie within the field of what is frightening. ...” In essence Freud describes the Uncanny as something we do not recognise, that is frightening almost purely because we cannot easily classify the object or situation around us. Freud uses the German word unheimlich which is clearly the opposite of heimlich (homely): “the opposite of what is familiar; and we are tempted to conclude that what is ‘uncanny’ is frightening precisely because it is not known and familiar.” But the alchemical magic in Ron Francis’ work is that he manages a distinct balancing act between the heimlich and the unheimlich. This is the odd response to Francis’ Hitchcockian Canary. Firstly, what is a bright yellow canary doing cavorting with a bunch of drab sparrows? And why do we feel an ominous silence hovering over this mis en scene? There are, of course, as many ways of making art as there are artists. Some, however, fall very clearly into fashionable stereotypes. One day it is video art that is hot, and students feel compelled to pick up the digital camera. The next it is installation art, and so on. Ron Francis is a painter, and in many ways his approach to painting is what sets him apart on at least two levels. The first is, clearly, technique. Francis’ unique style has touches in common with the American
realist Andrew Wyeth or the homely Saturday Evening Post illustrator Norman Rockwell, but while Francis’ style may be realistic in figurative terms, his content is far from it. His peculiar ability to find the oddest vantage point to view his imagined scenes – a view from a window, the height of a pedestrian overlooking a morass of crocodiles, bobbing along on the water level to view a carousing boatload of passengers – all contribute to his ability to seduce and envelop the viewer.
we smile, sometimes we shudder, sometimes we laugh out loud, but in the day and age when art so often refuses to reach out and touch the viewer, Francis does the opposite: He cajoles, he seduces, he envelops – he reaches out with the truth of his own, albeit often weird, visions to share them with us. It is a journey well worth taking. ( by Ashley Crawford)
Then there is his palette. Regardless of how bizarre his subject matter may be, Francis seems to take a calm breath before colouring his weird visions, executing the most strange mis en scene with a muted, gentle selection of colours, inspiring an instant sense of nostalgia, as though these are illustrations for a broadsheet magazine from the 1950s. One of the stories illustrated might be called “How to live with Crocodiles” as mothers and little children go about their business with nary a glance at the reptilian monsters around them. It is as though Francis is a reporter bringing back stories from a dimension similar to, but not quite our own. At times this alternate reality has a whimsical peacefulness to it, a yellow canary has learnt to live with the sparrows, a mother wheels her pram through monsters unmolested. But hovering to one side somnambulistic terrors emerge. Demons is a visit to hell. This is Norman Rockwell on severe opiates, these are the malevolent daemons sent to plague both St Anthony and Ron Francis, Mediaeval horrors that have survived into the information age, torn with vaginal splits and hungry for flesh, even if it is just the flesh of the mind. But, perhaps thankfully, Francis largely keeps his demons at bay. If there is darkness here it is leavened with humour, whimsy and a distinct sensitivity to the human condition. Whatever he paints he takes us on a journey. Sometimes 3
Moments of Freedom
Ron Francis 4
I 2008 I 100 x 80 cm I oil on canvas
5
The Exhibit
Ron Francis I 2009 I 120 x 180 cm I oil on canvas 6
7
Strange little Clouds
Ron Francis 8
I 2008 I 120 x 120 cm I oil on canvas
9
Malcolms Toys
Ron Francis 10
I 2009 I 24 x 36 cm I oil on canvas
11
The divine Window
Ron Francis 12
I 2007 I 160 x 160 cm I oil on canvas
13
Lifeboat
Ron Francis 14
I 2007 I 120 x 170 cm I oil on canvas
15
Time
Ron Francis 16
I 2008 I 120 x 120 cm I oil on canvas
17
Catenaries
Ron Francis I 12009 I 120 x 120 cm I oil on canvas 18
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Untitled
Ron Francis I 2008 I 50 x 40 cm I oil on canvas 20
21
Memories of Nielsen Park
Ron Francis 22
I 2008 I 120 x 170 cm I oil on canvas
23
Don & Bill
Ron Francis 24
I 2008 I 70 x 30 cm I oil on canvas
25
Darwin
Ron Francis I 2007 I 91 x 136 cm I oil on canvas 26
27
On the Edge
Ron Francis 28
I 2009 I 100 x 100 cm I oil on canvas
29
Clive
Ron Francis 30
I 2007 I 40 x 40 cm I oil on canvas
31
A Gentlemen
Ron Francis 32
I 2008 I 50 x 105 cm I oil on canvas
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Dad “Self Portrait as my Father”
Ron Francis I 2007 I 170 x 120 cm I oil on canvas 34
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Previous works
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Image captions from left to right / page 36: Morphine Dreams II / 2008 / oil on canvas / 80 x 60 cm Mum / 2006 / oil on canvas / 100 x 80 cm Lunch Break / 2006 / oil on canvas / 70 x 120 cm Three Ducks / 2006 / oil on canvas / 30 x 50 cm Vacuum Cleaner / 1998 / oil on canvas / 46 x 56 cm Morphine Dreams/ 2004/ oil on canvas / 100 x 120 cm Image captions from left to right / page 37: Boy on a Hill / 2004 / oil on canvas / 150 x 150 cm In Search of God / 1988 / oil on canvas / unknown Skateboarding / 2003 / oil on canvas / 112 x 107 cm Planetarium / 2004 / oil on canvas / 100 x 100 cm Sleepy Hollow / 2003 / oil on canvas / 40 x 70 cm Great Ex+++67 x 107 cm The Lovers / 2005 / oil on canvas / 80 x 60 cm A Girl with a Pick / 1984 / oil on canvas / 121 x 121 Image captions from left to right / page 38: Wine Barrel / 2002 / oil on barrel / 50 x 40 cm Hanging Man / circa 2001 / oil on canvas / 107 x 71 cm Three Fat Farmers / circa 1995 / oil on canvas / 110 x 91 cm Portrait of R. J. Evans / 2003 / oil on canvas / 60 x 52 cm Adultery / 1989 / oil on canvas / 150 x 150 cm Me and my Friend / 2006 / oil on canvas / 110 x 75 cm Barber Shop/ 2000 / oil on canvas / 71 x 101 cm Afternoon at the Beach/ 2003 / oil on canvas / 150 x 120 cm Image captions from left to right / page 39: Six Doors and a Blind Men / 2006 / oil on canvas / 41 x 107 cm The Ceremony / 2005 / oil on canvas / 120 x 100 cm In the Face of God / 2006 / oil on canvas / 70 x 110 cm
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Acknowledgments Nikkie Laurie Lara Nicholls Steve Ell
Special thanks Ron Francis
The Divine Window (Page 15) was shortlisted for the Blake Prize 2008
Catalogue compiled by Scott Livesey & Wiebke Brix ISBN 978-0-9806402-1-2 40