Jock Leggott's painting Wool Shed, from 1970. Oil on board. The painting is part of the collection of Sarjeant Gallery/Te Whare o Rehua Whanganui.
Jock Leggott's painting Wool Shed, from 1970. Oil on board. The painting is part of the collection of Sarjeant Gallery/Te Whare o Rehua Whanganui.
The discovery of her father’s award-winning painting in the Sarjeant Collection sent acclaimed New Zealand poet Michele Leggott MNZM on an archival “dig” to uncover a family story she didn’t know existed.
The search, its results and the paintings of her father Jock Leggott (1925-1981) will be the topic of New Moon in the Old Moon’s Arms, a talk by Michele Leggott at the Davis Lecture Theatre on Saturday, September 23, at 11am.
The event is presented by the Sarjeant Gallery as part of the 10th Whanganui Literary Festival.
Jaki Arthur, the Sarjeant’s relationships officer, said she was excited about this event.
“Michele is an award-winning poet, academic, essayist and editor, and the gallery is proud to be hosting her in Whanganui for this session, which will be part history and part mystery. Personally, I can’t wait to hear Michele read her poem New Moon in the Old Moon’s Arms, which she wrote as a memory log to help her remember her father’s paintings, which she can no longer see.”
Leggott will be joined by her sister Jane as they share memories of their father, a builder and joiner by trade. He started painting in the 1960s and in 1971 was the joint winner, with Whanganui’s Brian Coker, of an art competition held at the Sarjeant Gallery.
Jock Leggott’s winning painting is called Woolshed: Fletchers Bay and came to light in 2021 when Martin Edmond was doing research for the history of the Sarjeant Gallery, to be published in 2024.
“He emailed me and said, ‘Is this your dad? It’s the right spelling’. And I said, ‘Oh my God. I know exactly what that painting is’,” Leggott said.
The discovery was just a few months before from the 50th anniversary of his win, in which he shared half of the $300 prize with Coker.
Poet Michele Leggott will give a talk in Whanganui on September 23. Photo / Mark Fryer
Fletcher’s Bay, at the top of the Coromandel Peninsula, was a place of magical summer holidays for the Leggott children.
“It was very rudimentary. There were no facilities, and that’s exactly what my father wanted. He loved driving to the end of any road and getting off the beaten track. I think my mother had a hard time with it, as she had to cook and clean for six weeks of camping. As part of the deal, on the way home we would detour through Auckland so Mum could hit the shops and have a little bit of her own fun.”
The Leggott family lived in New Plymouth and Jock was not forewarned of the Sarjeant win, otherwise he would certainly have attended the announcement on the opening night of the exhibition. Michele remembers the family was ecstatic when they heard he had won.
“Dad was mentioned on the night, and there’s a lovely picture of Brian Coker with his certificate. The Whanganui winner, the local boy, is all over both the Chronicle and the Herald.”
Brian Coker died last year aged 81, but Michele and Jane would love to see any of Brian’s relatives at the event.
Curator of collections Jennifer Taylor Moore dug into the gallery archives and found a letter from the town clerk informing Jock of his win, but the certificate is missing from the family archives.
“Jennifer also found Dad’s letter of reply, and he’s saying, ‘Thanks very much! Delighted to get the cheque!’ Mum and Dad packed us into the car on the first available weekend and took us all down to Whanganui, where we saw the exhibition and Dad’s painting hanging on the wall at the Sarjeant.”
Jock died in 1981, followed 18 months later by his wife, Dulcie, and their adult children divided Jock’s paintings and drawings between them. He had exhibited in New Plymouth and Wellington and sold or given away work, so there are Jock Leggott paintings up and down the country. The Sarjeant is the only gallery that now holds a work.
After Martin Edmond’s email, the idea for a talk started to grow and the family became more and more interested, proposing a small exhibition of Jock’s oil and watercolour paintings to accompany the Whanganui event. These paintings will be on display at the Davis on the day of the talk.
Meanwhile, Leggott, a former New Zealand poet laureate, wrote a poem called New Moon in the Old Moon’s Arms in 2016 about the paintings she remembers well but can no longer see. Leggott began losing her sight in 1985.
“The poem is a memory list. It is me remembering all the paintings. I’ve got a good visual memory, and I wanted to get them all down in one place.”
The poem references the phase of the moon, during which the shining “new” crescent both holds and is held by the “old” larger part in shadow.
“This poem is all about generations, about how one generation holds another. It starts with my father and ends with the child who would have been his great-grand-daughter. Little Neve McNair is our brother John’s first grandchild. She was born in Australia when I was finishing the poem.”
The Details
What: Michele Leggott: New Moon in the Old Moon’s Arms
Bookings: iticket.co.nz or from the Whanganui i-Site
This event is one of three being presented by the Sarjeant Gallery for the 10th Whanganui Literary Festival on Saturday, September 23. The gallery is very grateful for the support of Murray and Denise Lazelle in presenting these events. For more information about the other Sarjeant events, go to sarjeant.org.nz or literaryfestival.co.nz.
