Australia Day, Part 2 - Art by Donald Friend

Part two of our Australian double feature consists of art work by Donald Stuart Leslie Friend 

(1915-1989) an artist whose reputation suffered from both his homoerotic drawings of young men while living and the posthumous publication of his diaries.  Those diaries described a number of 

illegal and immoral (even by my own modern standards) relationships with models and others.

 

Trio

All the information that came with this piece was the artist's name, Donald Friend.

 

Bali 1972

This is one of the later pieces in my Friend collection, being from Bali, Indonesia in 1972. 

Friend spent quite a bit of time in the East Indies near the end of his World War II service as 

a war artist, and he later returned there for both work and pleasure.  In fact, his tendency to 

date young men got him into trouble with the authorities on at least one occasion.

 

Florence, 1952

I enlarged the lower right of this Friend drawing and learned that is was done 

in Florence (Firenze) in 1952.  I have a few other works done by this artist in Italy.

 

1950

The only information I have on this Donald Friend piece is the year, 1950.

 

Australia Day, Part 2 - Art by Donald Stuart Leslie Friend

Donald Stuart Leslie Friend (1915-1989) was an Australian artist and diarist who lived much of his life outside his native land.  Stints in the UK, Nigeria, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and Italy added cultural depth to his work.  Friend didn't go out of his way to hide his own homosexuality in either his art or his writings, but the real bombshell came when his personal journals were published posthumously.  He described himself as "a middle aged pederast who's going to seed."  While I absolutely  disapprove of pedophilia, the artistic merit of Friend's work is considerable and it regularly appears in museums and galleries.  We start our Friday art series with his "Studies of a Male Nude" from 1952.

Although we might hope for clearer detail, the artistic impact of "Borneo Showers, 1945" is there.
This was done during Friend's World War II service as an artist with the Australian Army.

"Three Shy Nudes - Bali" is a 1970's work by Donald Friend.  His biographers mention that he had to leave Bali because of a "dispute with the authorities."  Given Friend's diary's description of his life, one has to wonder if that had to do with homosexual activity, perhaps with underage boys.

This undated Friend work is "Stuart Holmes with an Indian Gun."

This 1945 Friend drawing is most likely from his work as a war artist for the Australian Imperial Forces.  The pose of the man at right is indicative of a shower or bath.