Francis Bacon

I was lucky enough to be able to attend the press launch of the New Francis Bacon Exhibition at Tate Britain on Tuesday. I say that I was "lucky enough"; in actual fact, it is incredibly easy to get into a press showing. They didn't ask for any proof of identity, and I just wrote "Rose Rowson, BBC" on their signing in book. I do not work for the BBC. I never have worked for the BBC. I am certainly not qualified to work for the BBC. I am not Michael Caine.

So, having gained entry and also demanded a press release, I got to see the lovely lovely exhibition with some of the lovely lovely media. They had microphones. I was in awe of their power. There were also cameras. I hope that my stupid tights were filmed and will subsequently be famous. I also hoped that I might see Tom Lubbock or Brian Sewell, but I unforutunately did not. The day will come.

It was amazing getting to see one of my favourite paintings, Pope Innocent X, in the flesh. (When said aloud, the X should be said as the letter, not as the Roman numeral, while making the X Factor "X" sign with arms). Bacon's paint work is notable in that less is more, his style is defined by the build up of layers of paint, creating an image that convincingly portrays mass. Many studies of the painting are in the exhibition, which shows the piece moving further and further away from it's Velasquez origins.

Bacon is really good at painting teeth. Like, really good.

While the exhibition is commendable for bringing many career defining pieces and relatively unknown paintings together in an enviroment where they can be compared easily, it does have some downsides. One being a basically wasted room used to tell us that Bacon used photographs as a reference. Oh my goodness. I would never have thunk. For true? He used books and photography to influence his work?! NO WAI. This room could easily have been set aside for something else, i.e. MOAR PAINTINGS. It was a waste of time telling the audience what they already knew.
Another let down in the exhibition (but possibly hopeful for any aspiring artists, showing that even the masters were shit sometimes), was the room appropriately entitled CRISIS, which contained probably the worst paintings I have ever, ever seen, done while Bacon was in Africa. They are meant to be landscapes, of sunsets and so on, but he uses so much paint that it merely resembles Matisse, Lucian Freud and a bunch of non-descript Impressionists having a fight with lots of Prussian Blue and Cold Yellow paint. Seriously terrible in every single way. There's no form, all subtlety disappears. I feel that this may be somewhat linked to his desertion of red as the base colour of his work, and the lack of semi-human forms, as he works best in flesh tones.

Despite these minor compaints, the exhibition is one of the best I've seen this year, and I'll definitely be going again in the next few weeks. The one problem I generally have with Bacon is that many people approach him as a gay artist, but he shouldn't be exclusively defined through his sexuality, as is shown through the depth and scope of subject in the exhibition.

Props to the gift shop for the X firdge magnets. No props to the gift shop for stealing my money which I willingly handed over to pay for reading list books.

http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/exhibitions/francisbacon/default.shtm

Soon I'll probably be checking out the Rothko at Tate Modern and the Freize Art Fair. But don't quote me on that.

p.s. Go to Tate Britain to see the new Martin Creed installation as well; you can't miss it. Mainly because it is people. Running around the gallery.