LUCIAN FREUD
FROM FAR LEFT
Lucian Freud,
Reflection with Two
Children (Self-
portrait), 1965,
oil on canvas,
91x91cm; Lucian
Freud, Hotel
Bedroom, 1954,
oil on canvas,
91.5x61cmL
ooking at Lucian Freud’s
self-portraits, one observes the
development and maturation
of his craft. Open to experimentation
with new techniques, pushing
boundaries of composition, and paint
application, he stated that he asked
of his paintings, and his paint, to
“astonish, disturb, seduce, convince.”
And, for Freud, it was always
about the paint. It directed his work.“I want paint to work as flesh,”
he once said, according to artist
Lawrence Gowing’s 1982 monograph.
“As far as I am concerned, the paint
is the person.”
Near 70 years of self-portraiture by
the Berlin-born, British artist Lucian
Freud is explored at London’s Royal
Academy of Arts this winter in a series
of more than 50 paintings and
works on paper. Lucian Freud:The Self-portraits is the first exhibition
to study the gradual change in the
late artist’s self-portraiture, from his
flat, linear and meticulously painted
early works to the unflinching,
confrontational fleshy masterpieces
he produced in later years.
Painted at the age of 21, 1943’s
Man with a Feather is Freud’s first
self-portrait on record to be exhibited.
The white feather refers to a love
affair. The painting has a smooth,
glossy surface. It was created with
Ripolin enamel paint, applied with fine
sable brushes, to show every small
detail, yet hide the brush marks.
Freud admired Picasso, who may
have been the first to experiment with
this commercial brand of house paint.
The three-quarter length linear
composition is of Freud, clean-
shaven, looking intensely at the
viewer. Background events only
momentarily distract from the figure
of Freud. The dark jacket, the knotted
tie, the neat shirt; each is carefully
observed and draws the viewer in.
His long, pale hands are exquisitely
executed. Hands and eyes are always
noticeable in Freud’s art. He would
start from a small part of the work,
perhaps the eye, and work outwards
from it. A working method can be
seen in the unfinished Self-portrait,
c. 1956, with its light underdrawing,
usually a charcoal sketch, also visible.
In the 1940s, the artist Graham
Sutherland introduced Freud to
Francis Bacon, both men figurative
artists in an art world more focused
on abstraction. The meeting produced
a long friendship between Bacon and
Freud, and they regularly painted
portraits of each other. A small,
meticulous portrait of Bacon (now
lost), paintedoncopperbyFreud,© THE LUCIAN FREUD ARCHIVE/BRIDGEMAN IMAGESArtists & Illustrators 39