Francis Bacon by Francis Giacobetti

The conventional view of Francis Bacon is that he was something of a recluse, rarely venturing from the studio and even then restricting his socialising to meeting his bohemian and underworld friends at Soho’s Colony Club. Bacon, however, had something of a parallel life in Paris where he had a broad circle of friends, among whom was Francis Giacobetti.

In spite of his reputation for prickly uncooperativeness, Bacon agreed to collaborate with Giacobetti on this compelling group of portraits. They are pastiches in the true, positive sense of the word, being a kind of homage produced in the manner of his paintings. Bacon constantly used photographs and film stills, and photographers such as Marye, Muybridge and Harold Edgerton were almost part of his DNA. In addition, he had a collection of 1930’s medical text books in which x-rays and close-ups of the mouth featured prominently. Much of this reference material found its way into his paintings. The blurred distortions of movement, for example, or fusions of the inner and outer.

Another aspect of Giacobetti’s reinventions is the bleak existential void in which events occur. This empty darkness, never illuminated by more than a single, naked bulb, emanates danger, like a gathering storm. Small wonder that the Australian painter Brett Whiteley borrowed Bacon’s devices for his macabre series of paintings based on Christie, the 1950s serial killer.

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Exhibition Curator: Mara-Helen Wood, Director, Northumbria University Gallery