Leonard Sexton’s work lays bare the secret function of painting, respected by his peers yet still very much undiscovered.

His exhibition “Broken Halos” at the Menier Gallery is very powerful as it is loaded with surprises and challenges. The grand-scale paintings by the accomplished Irish artist form the core of the collection that is on tour to London and then NY. The images of Mother and child are messy, active and fierce. The canvases are filled with risk-taking swathes and strokes. He depicts the stresses of existence – our aging, the cost of caring for the young, our need for rest go in and out of focus in this new series. Sexton’s view of motherhood reveals a secret that is unexpectedly beautiful – his version shows the actual struggle and traumas of motherhood in these weighty, secular pieces. His successful series completed in his studio in Dublin in 2008, creates a contemporary counterweight to our expectation for a glorified iconic mother in the form of a blissful Madonna. Sexton’s exhibition reveals an immense range of emotion and is well worth seeing.

David Newton