Kurelek: A Biography by Patricia Morley (review)

HUMANITIES 225 the world the Church generated a body of forms and a beauty which has become very much part of our common cultural heritage. Such a purpose was, of course, laudable. One might note, however, that the Canadian curators met the challenge rather timidly: the four museums involved were without a unified policy on the Canadian content of the exhibitiona pity, since a strong Canadian presence would have made the exhibition both original and significant for our cultural history. The Canadian pieces were unfortunately added to the exhibition like appendages or curiosities and are not even included in the catalogue. Just as I would have wished to see a greater presence of local art in the exhibit, I would prefera more simple and accessible presentation from the writers of the catalogue. As this was not an exhibition for the specialist, many entries and some parts of the essaysin the catalogue seem too dense and erudite (especially the essay by Worsdale, less the one by Shepherd). In spite of this small quibble, both exhibition and catalogue are welcome. They have brought to large numbers of Canadians a direct knowledge of some of the highest products of Roman Baroque for the first time. (GIUSEPPE SCAVIZZI) Patricia Morley. Kurelek: A Biography Macmillan. xiii, 338, illus. $34.95 'The biographers job is not to supplement or update [the autobiographer 's1 but to see differently, freshly' (p 2), states Morley early in her 'quest for the man behind the artist and his personal myth' (p ix). Together with her equation of life-writing as an 'act of faith' (p ix), these are fitting presuppositions for a biography of William Kurelek. Yet, given the intensity of his proselytizing as both a Catholic convert and a didactic artist, his biographer's job must consist largely of filling in the details Kurelek filtered out in his various self-portraits. Indeed, for his Toronto years of success and fame, Morley does have to supplement his autobiography , Someone with Me (1973, 1980). Morley proceeds through perceptive biocritical analyses of Kurelek's work and often incorporates the views of those who knew him privately or professionally. Above aU, Morley draws on her free access to his voluminous personal papers as well as his clinical records at psychiatric hospitals in England. The result is an '''official'' or "authorized'" (p ix) biography. Despite such officialness, however, and despite the constraintsimposed at least implicitly by Kurelek's immediate family, Morley maintains her scholarly independence. Her basic attitude is one of tact and empathy. Her empathy is at times tinged with awe of the artist as a seemingly enigmatic man of destiny, and many of the corresponding chapter headings (e.g., 'In the Lion's Den' and 'The Crusader') indicate 226 LEITERS IN CANADA 1986 that her aim is to write an awe-inspiring story worth reading rather than a clinical case study. At the same time, Morley does not gloss over the disturbing reality of Kurelek's lifelong obsessions; she is careful to provide multiple perspectives on this 'latter-day Don Quixote' (p 182) whose religious vision tends to entail psychological blindness, dogmatism, and insensitivity to the little ironies of daily living. Itis Morley's central thesis that Kurelek's pervasive bitterness is mainly the result of a harsh father's thorough hostility to his son's artistic nature. In Siding with the artist who 'forced his will to forgive [his father] while his emotions fought a rearguard action' (p 296), she emphasizes his quest for true patriarchal authority and underestimates his parallel quest for matriarchal order, for the Mother Church, for creativity and wisdom. The latter quest is perhaps the most urgent in his life, yet he understates its pursult himself. As Morley shows, his personality is more like his father's than he would like to admit. Colour plates of eight of Kurelek's paintings and over ninety photographs , many of them from his scrapbook, illustrate the text well and create almost a biography within the biography. Regrettably, though, the approximately 4" X 3" reproduction of The Maze {J6" x 48" in the original) is far too small to reveal any of the harrowing details of Kurelek's most striking attempt...