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| All images courtesy of Greig Leach |
The capturing of a bicycle race has
taken many forms. From the breathless, florid prose of the
overwrought correspondents following the Tour de France writing for
L'Auto, then to still photography with unwieldy cameras and on
to sound with radio (and accordion accompaniment!) then film
newsreels and television and now Internet sites, podcasts and fans
waving cellphones. There have been attempts by painters to capture
the special moments of a race: Toulouse Lautrec's 1896 poster of
racers using Simpson chains; Lyonel Feininger's trapezoidal
speedsters in 1912; Edward Hopper's 1937 portrait of a Six Day Racer
in his cabin. But they all seem too studied, unable to depict the
energy that we know and love when we watch our cycling heroes in
action. But when the Road World Championships come to Richmond,
Virginia this fall there is at least one man ready to try.
Greig Leach is an accomplished painter
whose works have been exhibited throughout the United States. He has
received formal training at the Corcoran Museum's School of Art in
Washington, DC, Montgomery College in Maryland and Virginia
Commonwealth University in Richmond. In addition, he has been
Visiting Artist at the American Academy in Rome and is a past Fellow
of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, where he also served a term as
Artist-in-Residence. And not only are his painterly credentials thus
established but he also enjoyed bicycle racing as an amateur in the
1970s, the Precarbonian Era of American competitive cycling. And he
now enjoys the title of Official Artist of the World Cycling
Championships in Richmond.
Mr. Leach's affection for cycling and
his understanding of the sport have allowed him to capture today's
races in a colourful and exciting style. Watching the races live on
television, he endeavours to paint, using watercolours and oils, in
the moment. This video capture technique and a sure sense of colour
and composition result in rapid-fire but fluid miniature works of
original art, apparently in a postcard sized format.
I only recently became aware of Mr.
Leach's work during the early Spring races in Belgium this year. He
produced and displayed online wonderful pictures of the action at
Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne. His work is
characterized by bright splashes of colour, a feeling of movement and
only enough detail to sense who the riders might be. He has already
moved on to Paris-Nice activity and produces around five images per
stage. All of this excellent paintings may be seen at his blog, The
Art of Cycling (http://theartofcycling.blogspot.ca/)
and under each painting there is clear explanation of what is
happening: riders going over the cobbles; poor Tom Boonen crashing
out.
All this admirable activity should be
contained in a nice book, you say.
And thanks to the miracle of crowdfunding and his own considerable
initiative your desires are fulfilled. Mr. Leach felt guilt about
spending so much time watching the Tour de France rather than indulge
his workaholic tendencies. His wife suggested painting the racing
and sharing his work on social media sites was a way to deal with
this. He began his blog at the start of the 2013 Giro d'Italia and
produced daily paintings of each stage. He launched a crowdfunding
campaign to launch a new project in 2014: coverage of each stage of
the Tour de France. The result was his first publication, Book de
Tour, which was released early this year.
It is hard to believe that Mr. Leach is
not actually present for the races he paints. All of the work is
created from either television or internet video feeds in his living
room. He has the advantage of thus seeing the entire race and is
able to judge those moments best suited to his portrayals.
Book de Tour,
in its 220 pages, covers each stage of the 2014 race in glorious
colour. Each stage has a chapter which begins with his drawn profile
of the stage, followed by around eight pages of stage incidents and
concluding with a page showing the jerseys of the stage winners and
the overall leaders.
It is enjoyable to
relive the wonderful moments from that Tour de France. In Stage 1 we
had Jens Voigt chasing down the King of the Mountains jersey on the
road to Harrogate and Marcel Kittel, like some kind of monster,
crossing the finish line for the win, only to slide off the back with
a consolation pat from Romain Feillu during Stage 2. For Stage 5
Mr. Leach again shows his facility with rendering cobblestones for
the segment when Vincenzo Nibali showed he was a real contender.
Tony Martin's unexpected triumph on the hilly Stage 9 was captured in
the first and last painting in the series. Less happy events, such
as the abandonments by Froome and Contador, are included. And who
did not feel sorry for Jack Bauer and Martin Elmiger, caught right at
the finish line after leading most of Stage 15 by themselves.
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Present as I was in
Paris for the final stage, I particularly enjoyed reliving the
experience through these paintings, including the perfectly timed
moment when the peloton crossed the Seine into the city as French
fighter jets provided a red-white-and-blue finish. There's Jens
Voigt again! And Tony Martin having a mechanical. And Kittel once
more first at the finish line.
The lively images
coupled with the intelligent and concise summaries make this an
unusual and very attractive that-was-the-Tour summary compared to the
the photos we have seen so often in yearbooks past. Book de Tour is
a charming and entertaining volume that would appeal to art lovers,
cycling neophytes and hardcore fans equally. We suggest you follow
Mr. Leach's blog for colour commentary in the truest sense of the
word. His postcard paintings, each original artworks, can be
purchased as well. Bring on the World Championships!
227 pp.,
illustrated in colour, paperbound
Dementi Milestone
Publishing, Viriginia 2015
ISBN
978-0-9903687-6-2
Suggested Retail:
US$29.95/22.95 Euros
Available here at Amazon.com.
Available here at Amazon.com.
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