Self Portraits

Leda’s self-portraits were created largely in two periods, 1979 and 1985. They form an important part of her work and stand apart from her relatively few portraits of others.

Again and again, she painted herself.

Many of these works belong to years in which solitude formed part of her daily life, particularly in Winterskloof and Pietermaritzburg. The self-portrait became one of the forms to which she returned most insistently.

They also reflect her seriousness as an artist. Leda did not need public recognition to go on working, and the self-portraits remain among the clearest signs of that inward commitment.