THE BROOKLYN RAIL

A Tribute: Leon Golub
by Phong Bui
September 2004

*Photograph of Leon Golub, taken in 1989. Photo by David Reynolds.*

It was at the opening of his stunning retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum of Art in May 2001 that I first met the painter Leon Golub. While we were standing before one of his epic works from the Vietnam series, painted in the early 1970s, the inevitable subject of radical politics arose. Naturally, we spoke about the war in Vietnam and the conflict between France and Algeria in the 1960s in which both Leon and his wife, the equally distinguished painter Nancy Spero, had actively and unfailingly participated in through their art as well as in the numerous protests on the streets of Chicago, Paris, and later New York. Leon was born in Chicago in 1922 and earned his graduate degree from the Art Institute of Chicago in 1950, where he met Nancy, a fellow student; they were married a year later. Between 1959 and 1964 the family lived in Paris, and from 1964 until the present, Leon and Nancy made their home in New York City.

I called him the next day to follow up on our conversation from the day before, and we spoke for an hour and a half on the telephone. Our conversation began with Ho Chi Minh, Vo Nguen Giap, de Gaulle, Massu, Michael Harrington, Irving Howe, and ended up with the infamous episode between Leon and William Rubin of MoMA. "Are you half Jewish, Phong?" he gently said, to which I responded, "Are you half Vietnamese, sir?" We both laughed. Eventually the Rail’s Chris Martin conducted an extensive interview with Leon, which was published in the July/August issue three years ago.

Eighteen days later exactly about 4:30 p.m. on Wednesday the 12th of June, I brought a few issues of the Rail to Leon and Nancy at their studio in SoHo. We had a marvelous time together over tea and our common favorite Lu biscuits for the next three hours. By the time they walked me to the elevator door, since I had to catch a film at the Anthology Film Archives, both Leon and Nancy were already on the Rail’s Advisory Board.

For over the next two and a half years, with all of our struggles to continue publishing the Rail, I’ve always remembered Leon’s encouraging words: "We all have to RAIL against all the odds. It’s very important. You and your young friends are doing the right thing." Besides being a great artist whose conscience and conviction went beyond his canvases and the relatively narrow boundaries of the New York art world, Leon’s strength and wisdom, and his skeptical humor and wit, were inspiring to all of his friends and fellow artists as well as to many social activists. His presence shall be greatly missed. The Rail salutes Leon, and we continue our fight from the front in his memory. We extend our deep gratitude and heartfelt condolences to his beloved wife Nancy, his three sons Stephen, Philip, Paul, and their families.
—August 22, 2004