“In his magic world, be it sylvan or urban, a sense of order and justness prevails: he (Lehrer) is a latter-day Sarastro, the High Priest of Mozart’s Magic Flute. This is rich turf for rank and file art historians since from the Nuremburg Chronicle to the film Last Year at Marienbad several ideas have been assimilated into Lehrer’s work. But let’s not forget that there are other competent artists who had similar backgrounds and experiences which did not make them a Leonard Lehrer. We might come closer to the essence of his message if we listen to our inner most resonances to his work that answers beautifully to our deep-seated, unquenchable quest for eternity.”

– Bela Petheo , Saint John’s University Quarterly

Visually compelling, opulent, poignant, and expressive, Lehrer’s creations take on the ink jet in a way that seems absolutely appropriate – squeezed out in the printing they are a liquid light. Lehrer’s latest work embarks on a new artistic journey, yet one assembled from many decades of form making, process and thoughtful consideration of what constitutes an artistic oasis; and how the intellect will recognize a pleasure garden.

– Ronald M. Cohen, School of Art and Art History,University of Iowa “Catalogue Introduction

Details of the decoration of The Alhambra exist side by side with the medical charts and monitoring of Anna-Katrina’s life functions; Hebrew script appears along side Arabic calligraphy. “Paradise is a garden,” as Leonard said recently, hence the roses, the lushness of the paradise he has created in his art, the place where both his ancestors and his daughter are enshrined. All these places, all these visions, are part of the new world, the new reality that Leonard creates from the imperative of Borges. His cosmopolitan explorations are joined with his deep feeling of connection with the Yiddish family-based world into which he was born. Structure and design are joined; decorative elements, parts of gardens, segments of buildings are all integrated; the human sources as well form the new and personal reality that is the sum of the life and art of Leonard Lehrer.

– David M. Sokol,Professor Emeritus Director of Museum Studies, University of Illinois at Chicago “Catalogue Introduction"

“To see Lehrer’s mastery of this play, i.e., the play of gray tones on white paper, his power to initiate a sheerly visual delight, the eye must refocus.  Yet we never lose sight of his St. Petersburg.  An abstractionist lets his concerns with the medium overwhelm his references to the world.  Lehrer holds the world and the means of his art in precise balance.  His View of St. Petersburg makes it difficult to tell whether one is looking at an image of a place (this particular city) or the place of an image (this sheet of paper, inflected by these particular marks).  Lehrer joins the two aspects of his image together with the gently flickering light that permeates them both.

– Carter Ratcliff, Tamarind: 25 Years, Catalogue Introduction

“Lehrer is a latter day Classic sensibility who sees the human consciousness as an ordering faculty that filters the phenomenological surface of the world and converts it into a logical formalization.  It doesn’t matter that the perspective shifts from bird’s eye view to eye level.  The universal spectator has no perceptual nor conceptual restraints in this Platonic realm of ideal Forms.  Leonard Lehrer agrees that one must impose a vision on the world which thereby becomes real.  He quotes Martin Buber, ‘The task of the imagination is to imagine the real,’ to illustrate his view that what we take as representational-imitative art is really an act of the imagination in the fullest sense.  For Lehrer, art is the cumulative effect of the mind as one seeks to imagine the world.  Through art, the traceries of life’s experiences reveal the shape of oneself.  The structure of a work by Leonard Lehrer consists of boldly interlocking forms which contrast and complement each other in a harmonious balance.  The unity of surface accords with the illusion of depth; compact forms are set against the void; foreground matches distance; light responds to shadow.  The fusion of opposites extends to his style as a whole which is simultaneously spontaneous and controlled, fluid and precise, descriptive and stylized.  It is less a puzzling paradox than a complete expression of a truly integrated human vision.”

– Carol Donnell-Kotrozo, “Leonard Lehrer,” Art International

“In simple-complex, Zen-like items in the course of our conversation, Lehrer was saying, ‘If you love x, you impose a certain life upon x….’  His reference was not merely to objects and things of the mind, but to relationships between people and things, and people with people.  His mind is a rich and variegated mélange of ideas and projects, historical and literary references, aesthetic and philosophical treatises, present and future plans—not unlike the total visual phenomenon of richness and variety to be found in his favorite Mexican marketplace.  Was he not paraphrasing his idol, the poet Jorge Luis Borges, who claimed the way you arranged books on a shelf constituted an act of literary criticism?”

– Jules Heller, Author of Printmaking Today and Papermaking: The White Art
“The Sylvan World of Leonard Lehrer,” American Artist

“Breath (1998) is a four-color lithograph with Iris print collage.  Leonard Lehrer’s daughter has been suffering for years from cerebral palsy.  Her formidable struggle is the subject of this print, which collages two small Iris-print photographs of her, once in an oxygen mask and again in the throes of exasperation, to a ground of her two clenched fists in diptych format; the black squiggling lines of an EEG chart and a close-up, very abstract, of a blue oxygen mask are printed over the surface.  …a tough work to contemplate, it conveys the pain and frustration of their experience—of the propensity of science and technology to mask real human suffering, as well as the brave triumph of his daughter over an early death.”

“Leonard Lehrer’s work references his past and heritage, and emphasizes connection.  His world is one of amazement, and reverence with a desire to experience, learn and share; his energy and enthusiasm belie his years of experience.  He makes personal all that is around him, and his struggle to understand, embrace and integrate is illustrated in no better way than the inclusion of his daughter Anna in many of his compositions.  The same awe, respect and reverence he has for history and the abilities of mankind, apply to this child and her innocent thirst for experience that he and his wife Marilyn make certain she receives.  In her wheelchair she is included in these scenes, in environs of majestic design a paean to humankind’s indomitable spirit.  The respect given to the spirit.  She exists in spirit and body as timeless as the grandeur of architecture, or the beauty of the rose, in the world he has created.”

“Though his work may at first seem distant and perhaps even detached, its power and imagery can be as elusive as real life can be.  It is through careful consideration and close observation that the real impact is seen.  Work that the more one lives with, the more complex it becomes, the more there is, and the more satisfying it becomes.  This is the index of significance.  The juxtaposition of classical beauty, human beauty, intelligence and sophisticated design.  Leonard Lehrer is that kind of artist and person, whose influence will continue to assert itself long after he is able to.  His efforts and effect combine to be more than the sum of their parts.”

– Steven Rand, Director, Apex Art/artist,
New York City, Catalogue Introduction

“The untouched areas of pure, white paper move among the grays, setting them apart.  Lehrer refuses to permit the observer to take the easy way out, or to look through his images at the subject matter beyond them.  He deals not with the untrammeled landscape, but with the landscape contrived and disciplined: the formal garden as artifact and still life.  His is a classical art, abounding in formal devices.  The planes of his garden walls and buildings are wherever possible parallel to the picture plane.  When perspective is employed, it is Piero’s one-point perspective.  The spirit is that of the Renaissance, its architectural formality softened by the vision of Bonnard.  It is this mix of the personal and the historic, of the technical and formal, of the timelessness and immediate that makes Lehrer’s statement so compelling.  His lithographs do far more than mirror his hand; they mirror his mind and his eye.”

– Clinton Adams, Director, Tamarind Institute
Catalogue Introduction