Voyage of Ja through an artist

It has taken some two decades to celebrate the works of renowned artist Michael Lester through the publication of a book titled “Michael Lester-his life and works” authored by close friend Kenneth J. Jones.

“The reason it has come out now is that it has taken so long to gather photographs of his work from all over the world. But it is a very comprehensive collections of his works and it’s a biography from my own knowledge of him,” said the author who at one point lived with the now deceased Michael Lester and his wife’s Belmont residence in Montego Bay.

Born Michal Antoni Leszczynski, Michael Lester is originally from Poland but moved to Jamaica in 1952. He died in 1972 at the age of 66. The book offers a rare opportunity to examine the life and works of this brilliant artist who became so in love with the beauty and charm of this island that he dedicated most of his paintings and art years leading up to his death in featuring Jamaican scenery and people.

The journey brings with his early art stretches when he was a sailor, where he stretched anything in from a rope from the ship to trips of his voyages at sea nothing was taken for granted on his artistic quest.

After attending the Polish State Nautical College in Gdynia, he received his diploma in Marine Studies he later spent two semesters at the Krakow Academy of Fine Arts. He also studies Piano at the Chopin School of Music, Warsaw Conservatory. His mother, Eleanor Walter was also a painter was Lester’s first tutor in painting. After he arrived in Jamaica in 1955, he established the Lester Art Gallery in Montego Bay at 20 Market Street. The majority of his works at the time were sold to tourists and winter residents through the Lester Gallery according Kenneth.

So captivated is this author with the works of Michael Lester that he used the opportunity to encourage youths to develop a greater level of appreciation art and the persons who spend time creating beautiful masterpieces. He argued “it is important culturally for young people to appreciate his art and many other artist. This was a foreigner, a European and a very culturally educated man who came here and became apart of Jamaica”.