Francis Bacon UK, 1909-1992

Francis Bacon (28 October 1909 - 28 April 1992) was an Irish-born British artist and widely regarded as one of the most significant figurative painters of the 20th Century. Inspired by both the Old Masters and surrealism, Bacon's infamously grotesque imagery served as method of exploring nihilism and death at a time when Europe had been repeatedly savaged by war. Focusing on the human form, his subjects included crucifixions, portraits and self-portraits. Rejecting various classifications of his work, Bacon said he strove to render what he termed "the brutality of fact".

 

Born on October 28, 1909 in Dublin, Ireland, the self-taught artist moved to London to escape a hostile home life. Bacon did not begin to paint until his late twenties, having drifted in the late 1920s and early 1930s as an interior decorator and gambler. Bacon was often quoted saying that his artistic career was delayed because he spent too long looking for subject matter that could sustain his interest. Bacon subsequently became a firm fixture within the London art scene, with friends including Lucian Freud, Isabel Lambert and John Deakin. From the mid-1960s he mainly produced portraits of friends and drinking companions, either as single, diptych or triptych panels. After the death of Bacon's lover in 1971 (George Dyer), his work became even more personalized, with a renewed focus on mortality.

 

Bacon died on 28th April 1992 in Madrid, Spain. Today, his works are held in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Tate Gallery in London, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Hugh Lane in Dublin, and the Albertina in Vienna, among others.