Bruno Leydet, Montreal, Canada
Bruno Leydet is a portrait painter whose style was influenced mainly by expressionist painter Alice Neel, known for her portraits of family and friends, and the works of experimental filmmaker Kenneth Anger, whose short films merged surrealism and homoeroticism with a documentary style.
Leydet’s work features a tableaux collection centered on acrylic homoerotic portraitures, which narrate the sitters’ gay identities, surrounded by both pattern-oriented and surreal backgrounds. The inspiration for a work comes to Leydet from a pattern he finds, a historic painting, the model himself, or even a film he has seen. His male figures, even those appearing in groups, are often displayed with contemplative expressions or with a sense of melancholy amid their exotic surroundings .
ARTIST STATEMENT
Around the age of eleven, when I first became aware of the facts of life, I started making erotic drawings of male and female forms.
copulating, or at least the idea of what I thought copulating could be, as the biology book I had as an only reference kept abstract.
about the mechanics of the whole thing. The impulse was a mix of early hornyness and an avid curiosity and fascination with naked bodies.
And any bodies, male or female. The drawings that I thought I kept cleverly hidden were found by my mother who was much cleverer.
I don’t remember her scolding me for having done them, but all I remember is that one day I couldn’t find them, and later realized my mother had hidden them.
In a drawer in her room and had handwritten my age in at the bottom of the pages. I remember feeling ashamed, and my privacy invaded. But she never mentioned it,
Unlike when she found these soft porn magazine photos of a naked Brigitte Bardot I had collected and stashed away, and then I was told these images were bad and detrimental for women. Years later, when I was a young adult, this event came up in a lively discussion with my mom and my sisters, reminiscing about our childhood escapades. My mom revealed that at the time she wasn’t at all shocked by my drawings of naked people, on the contrary, she thought they were beautiful, clever and precocious. I was amazed but didn’t have the heart to tell her that her stealing them away at that time destroyed me. Later, I continued my erotic art ventures by concocting sci fi inspired comic strips of human men transported to unknown planets inhabited by extraordinarily endowed women in revealing miniskirt outfits.
My parents were totally into art and there were plenty of books around about paintings with naked people, and that was fine, it was art. There was no shame about that. And a close friend of the family, Aunt Mary, was a painter herself, and painted and drew female nudes which I was exposed to at a young age.
I started taking art classes when I was young, and part of those classes were life drawings, and I’ll never forget the first time we had a model. I had forgotten that this was coming up, and one evening at beginning of class as I was on the studio floor, sorting out the newsprint paper in my portfolio, I saw naked feet, with what seemed like a robe above them, walk past me. It was winter, and I remember thinking what on earth is that person doing. Then it came to me, it was model day, and I was terrified. There in front of us was a completely naked woman, I was petrified and embarrassed so I could feel my ears burning and I knew there must be bright red. But then I started drawing, and never looked back. Short poses, the model swiftly changing positions, I was enthralled and drew furiously, trying to capture the form as best I could. It wasn’t voyeurism, it was an endeavour, a challenge and it was exhilarating. The model must have been an artist of some king herself, as she was intense and deliberate in her posing, and during breaks would write passionately in a notebook. Her eyes were piercing blue in contrast with her dark boyish hair and looked incredible ensconced in her bright red taffeta robe. Then the next week it was male model time. It felt different, I had been looking forward to it, and it so happened that first model was what I thought a beautiful young man, and there was embarrassment when I saw him disrobe, but also the biggest thrill I ever felt. And whilst I knew I was bright red while I was drawing him and felt terribly shy about looking at him, I also undeniably had what you may call a raging boner I was trying to hide. the exhilaration of the act of drawing him and trying to capture the beauty was as it had been with the female model but also erotically charged.
At my regular school there was a boy I had struck a friendship with, a sweet shy Algerian boy with a wonderful self-deprecatory sense of humour. He lived close by in my neighborhood, and we would hang out together, I was around 16 at the time. He admired my drawings, and I managed to convince him of posing nude for me. It was I think both a torture and ecstasy for him, and to see how exposed and shy he was made my heart pounce. The revealing of himself to me, revealing what was most intimate was erotic but also moving. We eventually, as most boys do at that age, explored our bodies and shared pleasure quite innocently.
Later on, I was drawing nude bodies routinely in art school, the special thrill had faded, but it was my favourite thing to do. By now it was the mid eighties, and a certain woman painter started getting famous in Montreal for having the audacity to move to New York. She was doing male nudes. but very objectified, headless, and devoid of personality, and I thought I would do exactly the opposite. I knew I wanted to paint nude men, but specific men, and with heads, faces being as fascinating and important to me as bodies. At university, I started a series of paintings of friends and lovers, nude portraits, in a very large scale. I was in an open studio by myself one day using a drawing of an older male model as basis for a painting, and in walks Guido Molinari who would often walk around the building while on breaks of his own classes and gave advice to whomever wanted to listen. He came over and shrugged, nooooo no, if you’re going to do male nudes he said they have to be beautiful young men, not old ones, it has to be the Adonis ! this made me laugh, and I was surprised and amused by this , and it always stuck in my mind, I knew it was totally possible to do nudes that were not erotic and were absolutely legitimate and amazing, but his parti pris always intrigued and amused me .
I went through an abstract, multimedia stage, working out things with medium, but I was fascinated by portraits and nudes, and color and patterns, but I didn’t figure out exactly how to do what I vaguely envisioned. Doing polaroids was part of the process of trying to figure things out, and things started to come together when I was living in Paris. Internet had just started or barely, and so the main means to find models and lovers for that matter was through these sex encounter phone lines, where one would record a short message describing oneself and what it was one was looking for. I started putting out messages looking for male nude models. And surprisingly got a lot of attention. A plethora of young men showed up at my apartment on rue de Madagascar (close to where the infamous Violette Noziere was up to no good back in the 1930s ) I had never seen a picture of them, didn’t know what would show up at my door, they would disrobe , and as I was drawing and painting on large rolls of paper tacked to the wall I had to literally turn around constantly to observe then turn back to paint , an extraordinary choreography to witness according to the models. The dna of what I was going to do later on started there, but it’s only around 2010 that I finally got a clear vision of what I wanted to do and started to put the models in front of an imagined colorful patterned background, but that also came very much from Pierre et Gilles incredible works. I certainly didn’t want professional models. I wanted to paint the man I had seen in the metro, the face that I found beautiful made me want to see him naked, to see him revealed and vulnerable. But finding the models I wanted was not easy, even when back in Montreal I tried to find them by posting ads in the personals section in Craig’s list. Internet was the key and inspired by Elizabeth Peyton’s paintings of celebrities I started inventing models based on random
faces and bodies found on the net and modifying them to my whim. By the time I was on Instagram sending nudes was becoming trendy, and even more so when the pandemic hit, sexually starved men folk wanted me to paint them in the simplest attire, as if to say, I’m here, look at me, I matter, I have my own beauty. Please show them. and I did, and I do. Why? It’s beyond me, I just have to. I’m compelled, even though every time before I start, I think, how the hell am I going to do this? How am I going to be able to convey that beauty? And I just start, I just try.
Bruno Leydet
7th of May 1968 Montreal
EDUCATION
Master of Arts New York University 1993 Batchelor of Fine Arts, Concordia University 1991
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
“Pendejos », 2005, Casa de las Bodas galeria , Ciudad Juarez , Mexico “Œuvre au Blanc “ 2007, Visual Voice Gallery , Montreal
“Pecadillos “, 2012, La Buona Vista, Firenze Italy“Tableaux Vivants”, 2017, Youn Gallery Montreal
“Faune et Flore », 2018, Le Livart, Montreal“Bruno Leydet”, 2021, Craven Contemporary LLC, Kent Connecticut USA
“Modern Medieval (Ode to Marbodius of Rennes) » 2021, curated by Craven Contemporary LLC at Spring Break Art Show, New York USA
“Hedonist”, 2022, curated by Craven Contemporary LLC at Spring Break Art Show, New York, USA
“In Conversation with Bruno Leydet”, 2023, Craven Contemporary LLC, Kent Connecticut USA
Self-Curated Solo Exhibits, Studio Space , 2024-2025 , Montreal
COLLECTIONS
Hendrik and Arne Belgium Deurle
New York, Madrid, Montreal, , Buenos Aires.
About Bruno Leydet
Bruno Leydet started his training at the Westmount Visual Arts Center in Montreal and the
Saidye Bronfman Center. He pursued his studies in visual arts at the Cegep du Vieux also in
Montreal, before completing a BFA at Concordia University during which time he was studying
under famous painter Guido Molinari who greatly impressed the young artist with his
availability, generosity and great capacity of analysis.
Leydet then completed an MFA at NYU in New York City in painting drawing and video art. At this time, he won the Jack Goodman award for art and technology for his experimental videos. Leydet stayed on in New York for a few years working as an apprentice video editor at Electronic Arts Intermix, the cult video art editing and distribution and preservation space, rubbing elbows with Joan Jonas, George
Kuchar and Naim June Paik. Leydet also worked as archivist of the video collection of Anthology Film Archives, the mecca of American underground and experimental film, a dream come true
for the artist who studied the history of American underground film during his BFA.
His aesthetic is very much influenced then by the films of Kenneth Anger. In New York Leydet is
immersed in the contemporary art scene visiting all the galleries and museums, and the
discovery of painter Alice Neel, another great influence. Leydet returns to Montreal briefly
before leaving again for Paris, starting the male nude portrait project, and also experimenting
with polaroid photography. He worked as illustrator for the film costume designer Pierre-Yves
Gayraud.
After moving to Mexico for a few years, Leydet returns to Montreal again and in 2007
has his first solo show entitled “Oeuvre au Blanc” at Visual Voice Gallery presenting a mix of
large charcoal drawings and intimate polaroid photos of male nudes. By 2012 the male nude
portrait project is taking form, and the artist participates in many pop-up style group shows and
from there to MainLine Gallery.
In 2017 Leydet is represented by Youn Gallery and shows work in two group shows and one solo show entitled “Tabeaux Vivants”. In 2018 he is featured in the “Demi, semi, nu“ group show at the Livart art space, and asked to do a solo show which takes place in December 2018 entitled “Fabulations, flores et faunes”. In 2019 Leydet is part of the “New Nudes” group show at Craven Contemporary and has his first solo show in the United States in December 2020. Craven Contemporary also presented Leydet’s work at Spring Break Art Show 2021 in a solo presentation titled “Modern Medieval – An Ode to Marbodius of
Rennes”
The Paintings of Bruno Leydet
PORTRAIT OF A MAN.
Writer Ayesha Habib
Male figures posed in dreamlike contemplation. Surreal backgrounds that recall the reality-bending visual elements of both Salvador Dalí and Terry Gilliam’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. This is the work of Montreal-based painter Bruno Leydet. “My art is not about everyday life,” says the NYU grad. “It’s about the painting itself and beauty.”
Leydet’s quest for a defining style spanned years and continents, from Mexico to Paris, and grew roots from the influence of experimental filmmaker Kenneth Anger and expressionist painter Alice Neel. The result? A collection of kitsch-inspired acrylic-on-canvas paintings centred on homoerotic portraiture, a narrative about gay identities. Following appearances at Galerie Youn in Montreal’s Mile End neighbourhood last year, Leydet has positioned himself as one to watch in the domain of contemporary art.
Les fées (24/30 inches, 2019).
Les frères Grimm (24/30 inches Acrylic on canvas 2019).
Tbilisi (24/30 inches).
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