I had never heard of June Leaf before visiting The Gray Museum to see the exhibition “Shooting from the Heart.” Now, in hindsight, I’m almost happy I had never heard of her. Well, sad, because I hadn’t known her work existed before now, and if I had, I might have been able to enjoy her work earlier. But also happy, because finding a new artist in the moment feels special. It’s nice learning something new, learning about someone new every once in a while.
When walking into the exhibition “Shooting from the Heart” you could immediately tell that Leaf was not an ordinary woman. Her work spanned so many different mediums, sculpture, painting, drawing, and the gallery text said that the exhibition showcased pieces from many different periods of her career. It showed her depiction of the human experience and all its banality through her playful, dark, and sometimes unsettling style.
One work that fascinated me was a sculpture called “Drawing the Man.”
It felt like both a sculpture and a painting in one. It depicted two figures: one sitting on all fours, painting or creating the other figure, “the man.” Even though the figure on all fours was “drawing” the man, the man wasn’t two-dimensional. One of his legs was already out of the painting, almost like he was stepping into the real world. It felt like the figure on all fours was either creating the man through the painting or placing the man inside it.
The figure on all fours was in a weaker, almost submissive position in relation to the man. If I hadn’t known she was drawing him, I would have almost thought something grotesque was happening. The sculpture itself was very dark. The figure felt fragile yet harsh. She was sewn together. Metal pieces stitched with metal thread. The sewing felt feminine, but the material felt hard and violent. Everything about “Drawing the Man” looked dirty, like coal. The man looked dirty. The plane he was drawn on looked dirty. It almost looked like he had been making snow angels in the dirt, flapping his arms, making noise, leaving behind a mess. Like a child.
Another piece that fascinated me was “Drawings in Movement” (2020), made from charcoal on paper. When looking at it, I was struck by how real it felt. It felt like I was looking directly into someone’s head. As if Leaf had somehow put her brain onto paper. It was a beautiful image with text in the top center and bottom center. It felt thought through but also not thought through at all. The image was unsettling. The dark colors, the figures that looked dead or sleeping. Yet the bottom center text said the figure who looked dead was actually just sleeping. Almost humoristic.
At the top it said, “The secret is not drawing but DANCE.”
What did she mean? The whole image felt alive. It wasn’t just a drawing; it was movement. It felt like she didn’t see drawing as just an art practice, but as a whole theatre, a whole way of living. Painting something wasn’t just painting, it was moving and feeling.
The drawing is acrobatic. Kinetic. The figures are balancing, moving with grace. I kept wondering what was underneath the drawn circle. What happens if the figures fall? If they stop moving like the sleeping man? Is that dangerous? Is it dangerous if we stop moving? Stop dancing? Is that when we are dead? Or not?
What also drew me to the piece was a quote in the description:
“I could have been a dancer. I think like a dancer, and I’m obsessed with little details. It’s the body in space. It so happens that I like space, so my figure is in a space, which means she can move, because that is just one movement. So, when I draw it, I am dancing. When I’m drawing I’m thinking, ‘Oh, the leg is this way; the shoulder this way; oh no, the stomach goes this way.’ And that’s how it is to draw. Foot down, foot drop.”
This quote explained so much. Leaf doesn’t just draw movement, she draws as movement. Her drawings are dance. They are a choreography of the mind, the hand, the body, the figure, the space. And somehow, when looking at them, you feel like you’re part of that choreography too.
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