Bill Leak 'Are you with me': portrait of Sir Les Patterson

‘He’s not very nice, is he?’ says Bill Leak of Sir Les Patterson.

Sir Les (aka Barry Humphries) is an international statesman and a former ‘Minister for the Yartz’. He also sits on the Australian Cheese Board.

‘I think Sir Les is everything that Barry Humphries hates about Australian men and I have always admired Barry Humphries as our pre-eminent satirist,’ says Leak.

‘The portrait is a caricature of a caricature. As Australians we all recognise Sir Les, probably because we all know at least one of him and, more worryingly, we just might be recognising ourselves. He is at once both hilarious and appalling.’

Born in Adelaide in 1956, Leak studied at the Julian Ashton School before embarking on a career as an artist, illustrator and cartoonist, for which he has won numerous awards. He has been a finalist in the Archibald Prize on nine occasions and is the subject of a portrait in this year’s Archibald by Esther Erlich. His portrait of Patterson won the Packing Room Prize.