Happy Birthday Albert Lee Tucker ~ 1914 – 1999 Al was an Australian artist, and member of the Heide Circle. Tucker left school at 14 to help support his family and had no formal art training, but obtained work as a house painter, cartoonist and commercial illustrator,[4] in an advertising agency before joining the commercial artist John Vickery. For seven years he attended the Victorian Artists Society evening life drawing class three nights a week. Tuckers main inspirations include post-impressionists, expressionists and social realists, as well as personal experience. Tuckers work was strongly influenced by the realistic reflections of two important émigré artists, Josl Bergner and Danila Vassilieff. Tuckers first significant works were produced during his involvement in the army. In 1940, Tucker was called up for army service and spent most of his time working in Heidelberg Military Hospital drawing patients suffering from wounds and mental illnesses as a result of war. He produced three important works at this stage, Man at Table, a pen and ink illustration of a man whose nose had been sliced off by a shell fragment, The Waste Land, an image of death sitting on a stool watching and waiting, and Floating Figures, of two figures floating down a hall, a third with a demented smile. All of these images illustrated the horror and madness of war, but in a style reflecting his social realists surrealistic and expressionistic style. In 1941, Tucker married fellow artist Joy Hester, and they had a son, Sweeney. It emerged many years later that Tucker was not the boys biological father—it was probably Australian jazz drummer Billy Hyde, with whom Hester had had a brief affair. His marriage broke down in 1947 and Tucker traveled to Japan and Europe, leading a bohemian life, painting, exhibiting and taking odd jobs. When Hester was later diagnosed with Hodgkins lymphoma, she gave Sweeney into the care of the Reeds, who adopted him. Joy Hester died in 1960, and Sweeney committed suicide in 1979. Tucker married Barbara Bilcock in 1963. It was the second marriage for both. Tucker died in 1999. Barbara Tucker controls the Tucker estate.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 12:04:53 +0000
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