Bacon, Francis

Bacon, Francis
born Oct. 28, 1909, Dublin, Ire.
died April 28, 1992, Madrid, Spain

Irish-British painter.

He lived in Berlin and Paris before settling in London (1929) to begin a career as an interior decorator. With no formal art training, he started painting, drawing, and participating in gallery exhibitions, with little success. In 1944 he achieved instant notoriety with a series of controversial paintings, Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion. His mature style emerged completely with the series of works known as "The Screaming Popes" (1949–mid-1950s), in which he converted Diego Velázquez's famous Portrait of Pope Innocent X into a nightmarish icon of hysterical terror. Most of Bacon's paintings depict isolated figures, often framed by geometric constructions, and rendered in smeared, violent colours. His imagery typically suggests anger, horror, and degradation.

* * *

▪ British painter
born Oct. 28, 1909, Dublin, Ire.
died April 28, 1992, Madrid, Spain

      British painter whose powerful, predominantly figural images express isolation, brutality, and terror.

      The son of a racehorse trainer, Bacon was educated mostly by private tutors at home until his parents banished him at age 16, allegedly for pursuing his homosexual proclivities. Self-taught as an artist, he drifted in Berlin and Paris before settling in London in 1928, after which he worked as an interior decorator. He had also begun painting, though he did so without recognition until 1945, at which time the original and powerful style displayed in such works as “Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion” (1944) won him almost instant notoriety. His mature style emerged completely with the series of works known as “The Screaming Popes” (1949–mid-1950s), in which he converted Diego Velázquez's famous “Portrait of Pope Innocent X” into a nightmarish icon of hysterical terror.

      Many of Bacon's early paintings are based on images by other artists, which he distorts for his own expressive purposes. Examples of such themes are the screaming nanny from Sergey Eisenstein's film Potemkin and studies of the human figure in motion by the 19th-century photographer Eadweard Muybridge. Most of Bacon's paintings depict isolated figures, often framed by geometric constructions, and rendered in smeared, violent colours. He was admired for his skill in using oils, whose fluidity and mysteries he exploits to express images of anger, horror, and degradation. His later portraits and figure paintings are executed in lighter colours and treat the human face and body in a style of extreme distortion and contortion.

      Bacon's devotion to his art stood in curious contrast to his subject matter and the eccentric squalor of his personal life. Because he destroyed many of his early works, only a few examples can be found, mainly in American and European museums.

* * *


Universalium. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем написать курсовую

Look at other dictionaries:

  • BACON, Francis — (1561 1626) Francis Bacon was a lawyer, man of letters, and philosopher in the Elizabe­than and Jacobean eras. Although he eventually became lord chancellor of En­gland, he is best known for his Essays and writings concerning the new philosophy,… …   Renaissance and Reformation 1500-1620: A Biographical Dictionary

  • Bacon, Francis — (1909 92)    by John Marks   Deleuze s aim in Francis Bacon: The Logic of Sensation, as with all his other works on art, is to produce philosophical concepts that correspond to the sensible aggregates that the artist has produced. The logic of… …   The Deleuze dictionary

  • Bacon, Francis — (1909 92)    by John Marks   Deleuze s aim in Francis Bacon: The Logic of Sensation, as with all his other works on art, is to produce philosophical concepts that correspond to the sensible aggregates that the artist has produced. The logic of… …   The Deleuze dictionary

  • Bacon, Francis —    b. 1909, Dublin; d. 1992, London    Painter    Francis Bacon was the most prominent English painter of the twentieth century until his death in 1992. Major retrospectives were assembled by the Tate Gallery in 1962 and 1985 (see Tate(s)). A… …   Encyclopedia of contemporary British culture

  • Bacon, Francis — (1561–1626)    Politician and Philosopher.    Bacon was the son of Queen Elizabeth I’s Lord Keeper. He was educated at the University of Cambridge and was first elected a Member of Parliament in 1584. He became Solicitor General in 1608, Attorney …   Who’s Who in Christianity

  • Bacon, Francis — (1561 1626)    English philosopher, essayist, and royal official, knighted by King James VI and eventually raised to the peerage. The son of a high ranking official of Queen Elizabeth I, under James VI he rose to be lord chancellor, the highest… …   Historical Dictionary of Renaissance

  • Bacon, Francis — (1561–1626) English statesman. As a philosopher of science the first notable example of the empiricist tendency of English thought, but perhaps more importantly the prophet and protector of the dawning scientific revolution. He was a precocious… …   Philosophy dictionary

  • Bacon,Francis — I. Ba·con1 (bāʹkən), Francis. First Baron Verulam and Viscount Saint Albans. 1561 1626. English philosopher, essayist, courtier, jurist, and statesman. His writings include The Advancement of Learning (1605) and the Novum Organum (1620), in which …   Universalium

  • Bacon, Francis — (1561 1626) Filósofo y político inglés. Es considerado el fundador del empirismo. Estableció una clasificación metódica de las ciencias, expuso el sistema de observación directa de la naturaleza sustituyendo el silogismo por la inducción, y atacó …   Enciclopedia Universal

  • Bacon (Francis) and man’s two-faced kingdom — Francis Bacon and man’s two faced kingdom Antonio Pérez Ramos Two closely related but distinct tenets about Bacon’s philosophy have been all but rejected by contemporary historiography. The first is Bacon’s attachment to the so called British… …   History of philosophy

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”