Talk

BFA Photography and Video presents a conversation between photographer and filmmaker David Julian Leonard and department faculty member W.M. Hunt. 

Leonard will project many images from his recent book Tender Is the Light, while discussing his work. He will also discuss his background, his education at the elbow of William Eggleston, his work in documentary films and his new life as an expat living in Arles. Tender is the Light, published by Kehrer-Verlag of Heidelberg, Germany, includes sixty-six images stretching back 20 years and combines work he produced with color negative film until 2009 with work he made after moving to digital cameras. It features a short text by W.M. Hunt, who will introduce Leonard for this presentation at SVA.

Leonard is an American photographer and filmmaker from Memphis, Tennessee. His pursuit of art photography was initially inspired by a close friendship with fellow Memphian William Eggleston. Like so many photographers working in color today, he lives under the long shadow of his mentor; it is a shadow with which he is deeply familiar.

The Photographers' Gallery in London presented Leonard's first solo show in 1999 and his photography has generally found a greater audience in Europe over the years. In 2016, his collection of work Tender is the Light was released by German publisher Kehrer-Verlag. He now lives in Arles with his wife Valentine, who is French.

Leonard's work is recognizable for his integration of vivid color into compositions that seem to be both casual and formal at once. In the afterward to Tender is the Light, W. M. Hunt has written: "Overwhelmingly he lives in a world of exalted color. He has the seemingly seamless throw away skill where colors can be monochromatically lurid (red or green) or color contrasted in an almost calibrated way (blues against yellow, red against green). There is an exceptional eye and talent here....like a great musician, he surprises us with how he uniquely finesses the notes."

Leonard's storytelling choices are also informed by his work on documentary films as a cinematographer, editor and director. David Williams, head of the Edinburgh College of Art's Photography Department wrote that "in common with much of the greatest photography, Leonard's work celebrates the awesome power of the medium to lift the veil of perception in our everyday lives. These seemingly disparate images on closer inspection reveal a jewel-like matrix of inter-related moments. This is poetic narrative at its very best."

Most of his documentary film work has been about subjects from the heart of American music (Stax Records, Johnny Cash, Mississippi Blues, etc). This trip to New York fits into his travels to complete filming for his current project: a documentary about the life and work of musician Alex Chilton.