Design and Art Australia Online

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Biography

Date modified Dec. 19, 2011, 10:09 a.m. Dec. 18, 2011, 4:31 p.m. Born in Yorkshire, he started painting as a 'primitive' in the style of Douanier Rousseau after meeting Léger, Vlaminck, Marie Laurencin et al. when working in Paris as a house painter and marbler, but his work soon became more sophisticated. He migrated to Sydney in 1928 and held an exhibition of his abstract paintings the following year. From 1933 to 1938 he was an advertising director at Elstree Studios, Sydney. During the war he worked at Slazengers designing ships for the navy, drawing daily cartoons for editor Brian Penton at _The Daily Telegraph_ in his spare time. ¶ ¶ He notes in his autobiography ( _The Dinkum Pommie_ 1964, 177-8) that it was difficult to get them to the paper before the jokes dated: 'I would shove my drawings on Brian Penton's desk at midnight or 7 a.m. and sometimes even my wife took them in for me'. When transferred to the Ministry of Munitions, however, he was far closer; the building was in the same street as the _Telegraph_ . Examples of his _Telegraph_ naive outline-style cartoons on postwar food shortages and manpower control in 1945 are illustrated in Coleman & Tanner (130-31). See also _Hesling's Cartoons_ Consolidated Press Limited, Sydney, 1945, 96pp. ¶ ¶ Hesling also drew political cartoons, and said of them: ¶ "Had I stuck to comic sketches of American servicemen buying tickets for _Il Trovatore_ on the black market and such like, all would have been well. But my drawing had improved so much by now that I could get passable likenesses of Eddie Ward and Mr. Curtin. Brian saw me as one of those political bores - the scorched-earth boys who draw Russian bears and rising suns using soot instead of ink. What he didn't like about me, of course, was having to write letters about art to pedantic readers who objected to a Prime Minister with six fingers on the hand instead of five." ¶ ¶ At the Ministry Hesling worked with *George Molnar* , who he claims he prodded into becoming a cartoonist (pp.182-6) and who gave him lessons in drawing in return. He left the Ministry to work full-time on _The Daily Telegraph_ and was sent to Canberra (p.187) - which he hated. Sacked from the _Telegraph_ , he moved to _The Sydney Morning Herald_ , then to _Smith's Weekly_ to replace *John Quinn* (who moved to _Woman's Day_ in 1947) where he remained for four years until it closed (in 1950). ¶ ¶ He also contributed occasional whimsical cartoons and articles to _Australia: National Journal_ , eg. May 1947, and to _Australia_ _: Week-end Book_ . Vol.2 (1943) of the latter has seven cartoons, eg. couple looking at nudes, satyrs and pirates on beach and saying, "Aren't those the people we met at Mr. Lindsay's?" Vol.3 (1944) has 10 cartoons, eg rose plant growing hands, "We think it's a Salvador Dali". Vol.4 (1945) features only two works by Hesling. Another wartime book he illustrated with simple, whimsical, line drawings was _These Beastly Australians_ (Australasian Publishing Company, Sydney, n.d.), short, light verse by Leon Gellert about various Australian animals. References to wartime and Macarthur make it clear it's wartime. ¶ ¶ Out of work in 1950, Hesling did a few recorded talks for the BBC at 30/- a time (p.197) and wrote a well-reviewed book, which still earned him less than 100 pounds. He wrote freelance articles for the _Herald_ at about 8 quid per 1000 words, 'and, of course, I did joke drawings. There's a terrific market for these; I remember once _Man_ paying me three guineas for a whole page of them, one of which I later sold to the _New Yorker_ (as an idea) for forty dollars.' He also drew cartoons for _Meanjin_ , _Quadrant_ , _Nation_ , the _Manchester Guardian_ and the _Listener_ (London). He wrote art criticism for the Sydney _Observer_ until Donald Horne sacked him for reviewing an exhibition he hadn't seen; his replacement was *Robert Hughes* (Humphrey McQueen, 'Rolling Column', _ABR_ 109, April 1989). ¶ ¶ Hesling painted numerous murals betweenfrom 1950 andto 1955 in NSW, Victoria, SA and North Queensland (Emerald) and 'decorated his merry writings with his own curious humorous drawings' (Blaikie, 132). He pioneered painting in vitreous enamels in Australia, exhibiting examples in Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and Adelaide. At an exhibition of his enamels on a great range of subjects at Underwood Galleries in Sydney in 1965 he said: ¶ 'I have expressed myself in many different ways in order to prove the validity and versatility of vitreous enamel as a painting medium. Painting in enamel is no harder than painting in oils - merely different. Its great advantage as a medium lies in its suitability for exterior mural work and in its durability at all temperatures. It has been suggested that enamel as an art form cannot be entirely controlled. This is nonsense as a glance at the portrait work of any one of the famous enamellers will show.'(_SMH_ 14 Nov 1965 p97) ¶ ¶ He had a long association with Greenhill Galleries in Adelaide. In 1999, long after he died, Greenhill Galleries offered four of hishis 1969 set of four 'Australia Day' enamel panels for sale at $100,000 (_The Advertiser_ 2 Oct 1999 p60). ¶ ¶ His first book, an illustrated account of Sydney, _Sydney Observed_ (1953), was followed by several humorous illustrated autobiographies: _Little and Orphan_ (1954), _The Dinkumization and Depommification of an Artful English Immigrant_ (1963)(later published as _The Dinkum Pommie_), _Stir Up This Stew_ (1966), _I Left My Tears in the Fridge_ (1972), _Around the World on an Old Age Pension_ (1974)(which includes _My Picture Book_) and _Art Ruined My Career in Crime_ (1977). His play, _My Life with an Interval for Aspirin_, was performed in 1972. Another play, _Bear with Hesling or My Life and Art Times_, was performed in 1977. ¶ ¶ In a review in the _SMH_ (Prof) A D Hope said of _Little and Orphan_ that it 'tapped a vein of pure and natural comedy...It is one of the most engaging books I have read for a long time'. It was republished by Humorbooks in 1967. Olaf Ruhen praised _Stew up This Stew_ in the _SMH_ of 11 June 1966. Clement Semmler praised _I left My Tears in the Fridge_ in the _SMH_ of 9 Sept 1972 p22 and _Around the World on an Old Age Pension_ in the _SMH_ of 11 May 1974 p13. ¶ ¶ His one-man stage performances, _My Life with an Interval for Aspirin_ (1972) and _Bear with Hesling or My Life and Art Times_ (1977) were well received. ¶ ¶ Hesling and his wife Flo' left their longtime home at Castlecrag, Sydney, in 1962 and moved to North Adelaide. Chris Butler's article "Bernard Hesling: A self-confessed amateur nut-case" _The Adelaide Review_ Dec 1984/Jan 1985, was a one-page biography. Hesling was awarded an OAM in June 1985 for his service to the arts. _The Advertiser_ (17 June 1985, p2) noted the award and described Bernard's varied life in its Monday Profile article "A colorful 80 years, and still making his mark". He died aged 82 in 1987. Flo' predeceased him. There were no children. An obituary by Tim Lloyd "Hesling: a versatile, lively life" was published in _The Advertiser_, 16 June 1987, p.17.