Controversial News Corp cartoonist Johannes Leak has been awarded a $40,700 contract to paint an official portrait of Tony Abbott.
According to AusTender, Johannes Leak Illustration Pty Ltd will receive the payment from the Department of Parliamentary Services for a contract to run from February 2021 to July 2022. The commission was awarded through limited tender.
A spokesperson for DPS told Guardian Australian the contract relates to a commission of “an official portrait for the historic memorials collection” – which includes former prime ministers, governors general and other leading parliamentarians.
Guardian Australia understands the commission relates to a portrait of Abbott, but the spokesperson declined to comment.
“The subject of official portraits is formally announced when the portrait is unveiled,” the DPS spokesperson said.
“The process to produce official portraits involves the subject of the portrait selecting an artist. Their selection is then approved by the National Portrait Gallery prior to the contract being awarded.”
Leak has courted controversy in cartoons for the Australian newspaper, most recently, for an August 2020 portrayal of Joe Biden referring to his vice president Kamala Harris as a “little brown girl”.
The Biden/Harris cartoon was widely denounced, but the Australian stood by its cartoonist, with editor Christopher Dore responding to the controversy in a special editorial.
“The intention of Johannes’s commentary was to ridicule identity politics and demean racism, not perpetuate it,” Dore wrote.
“The Australian deplores racism in all its guises, as does Johannes.”
Johannes is the son of cartoonist and artist Bill Leak, whose own work in later years was also controversial. Leak senior painted the parliament’s portrait of Bob Hawke.
The senior Leak’s 2016 cartoon depicting a drunk Indigenous man who had forgotten his own child’s name was referred to the Human Rights Commission, but the complaint was later withdrawn.
“Limited tender” means the department directly approached one or more potential suppliers without an open call for all interested parties to bid for the job.
Commonwealth procurement rules allow limited tender for numerous reasons including if there is “no reasonable alternative or substitute” because the contract is “for works of art” from a particular person or business.
However, the rules also require the exemption or limited tender condition to be reported on AusTender. The Leak contract notice does not state the artistic exemption as the reason for the limited tender.
