Francis Bacon was an Irish born artist, he was untrained and only became an artist in his late 20’s. Bacon said that the delayed beginning of his career was because he hadn’t found subject matter to sustain his interest. When he finally did find the right subject matter he quickly made his name in the contemporary art world with his distinguished style of bleak and unsettling paintings.

Below are some works that explore of the human condition’s darker sides, linking heavily to the questions I wish to pose with own work in this project. In the 1st and 2nd slide Bacon’s manipulation and distortion of the human face create portraits of violence and gore, almost as if the people depicted have been beaten into bruised almost unrecognisable states. The feeling felt when viewing the work is something I would like to recreate in my subject matter and paintings/drawings.

The last 2 images on the slide use black backgrounds and show depressing and distressing images, the sad drunk and the haunting screaming figure. these works delve into the human psyche and pull out imagery fit for nightmares. Moving forward I will experiment with also working from black, using large brushstrokes to create translucent much like Francis Bacon.