Religious Meanings on Francis Bacon: A Review of the Francis Bacon Retrospective Exhibition at Tate Britain from September 11, 2008 January 4, 2009

[IR 12.1 (2009) 000–000] doi:10.1558/imre.v12i1.000 Implicit Religion (print) Implicit Religion (online) ISSN 1463-9955 ISSN 1743-1697 Religious Me...
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[IR 12.1 (2009) 000–000] doi:10.1558/imre.v12i1.000

Implicit Religion (print) Implicit Religion (online)

ISSN 1463-9955 ISSN 1743-1697

Religious Meanings on Francis Bacon: A Review of the Francis Bacon Retrospective Exhibition at Tate Britain from September 11, 2008–January 4, 2009 RINA ARYA University of Chester

[email protected] Francis Bacon is arguably the most well-known British artist after J.M.W Turner, and his forthcoming centenary in 2009 has been well documented in both the art world and the mass media. The BBC archive contains a comprehensive range of interviews and footage with the artist. To commemorate the centenary, the Tate has put together the third retrospective on Bacon (the previous ones were in 1962 and 1985 and were also held at the Tate), which has brought together some of his best works from different periods of his life. This extensive exhibition will then move to the Prado (Madrid) from 3 February–19 April 2009, and then on to the Metropolitan Museum in New York from 18 May–6 August 2009. On entry to the exhibition the viewer is faced with the Second Version of Triptych 1944 (1988).1 This immediately sets us on guard. Three menacing beasts, one in each panel, either turn their back to the viewer (as in the left panel) or snarl and snap. The notable absence of eyes in these figures means that the viewer cannot challenge the positions that we are being placed in because we cannot confront these figures, but are instead confronted by them as they grimace and growl at us. Fixed on podiums, and against a blood-red background, these creatures foretell doom. The monumentality of these figures, each featured on a panel measuring 198 x 147.5 cm and together spread across the entire wall, engulfs the viewer. Even before stepping into the room this painting is visible from the open niche and gives us a foretaste of the show. The conspicuous placement of this triptych © Equinox Publishing Ltd. 2009, Unit 6, The Village, 101 Amies Street, London SW11 2JW

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is deliberate and gives an indication to the viewer who is perhaps not so familiar with Bacon’s work of the preoccupations of his subject matter and also the alarming effect that his paintings have on viewers. As the title of this review suggests, I want to demonstrate the preoccupation that Bacon has with themes that are addressed in religion: the relationship between life and death, the role of evil in society, the position of the human being in a world that is bereft of God and of ultimate meaning or purpose. In a world without God, the human is drawn closer to the beast, and this is an ongoing theme in Bacon’s work (which is given a particular focus in Room 1: Animal). Bacon employs religious symbols, namely the crucifixion (which is the subject of Room 4: Crucifixion) and the figure of the pope (of which there are innumerable examples in the exhibition, from Head VI, 1949, to the papal portraits such as Study after Velázquez, 1950, and Study after Velázquez’s Portrait of Innocent X, 1953). In statements about his work he claimed to be resolutely atheistic. Why then was he relentlessly drawn to these two popular iconographical reference points of the Christian tradition? I suggest that he did not use these symbols to support the Christian narrative or any other theological tradition, but that he used these symbols to explore questions about the meaning of life and existence. He explores the human nature of mortality and the plight of being thrown into a Godless world. The alienation of the individual and the realization of one’s fate are questions relating to what Tillich would describe as being of ultimate concern. Rooms 1 to 4 The exhibition consists of ten rooms, which the viewer weaves his/her way through, and the paintings are largely arranged chronologically (Room 4: Crucifixion is an exception). Each room is given a name that corresponds to the subjects of the works. Room 1: Animal examines the significance of our animal instincts, which are usually latent, and demonstrates what happens when they come to the forefront of human expression. In these instances we experience the brutal, ravening capacities that exist beneath the veneer of civilization. For those unfamiliar with Bacon’s art, this room, rather in the manner of Second Version of Triptych 1944, presents a startling and immediate connection to the central issues of Bacon’s concerns: his expression of the proximity between the human and the animal, and the inevitable mortality that encapsulates the universal condition. The sense of universality is conveyed by the absence of distinctive features in the works. In Figure in a Landscape (1945) and Figure Study I (1945–1946) the © Equinox Publishing Ltd. 2009

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presence of a body is suggested, but the faces are hidden from view. More information is given in Figure Study II (1945–1946) and Painting (1946), where we witness the face that breaks out into a scream. More concentrated studies of the scream are conveyed in Head I (1947–1948) and Head II (1949). In the crossover from the human to the animal, and the generalized sense of despair articulated in these examples, Bacon is conveying the existential predicament of the human in post-war life. Room 2: Zone focuses attention on another characteristic of Bacon’s work, the pictorial frame. In his works of the early 1950s Bacon was thinking about the presentation of form and he devised the three-dimensional space-frames that operate as powerful devices in his work. They serve to draw attention to the three-dimensional figure within the “pictures’ fictive space” (Gale 2008, 107). Study for a Crouching Nude (1952) and Study after Velázquez’ Portrait of Pope Innocent X (1953) conveys the effects of this device. In both these examples the striated vertical veil of brushstrokes breaks up the surface of the painting and draws the eye to the focal point of the scream. In the former example it draws attention to the taut musculature, of the body and in the latter example we are led to the point of disintegration, symbolized by the screaming mouth. The literal darkness of the palette and metaphorical darkness of the sensibility pervades Room 3: Apprehension. The paintings in this room concentrate on a single anonymous male figure in a dark suit. These include Study for a Portrait (1953), Study for a Figure II (1953–1954) and Study for a Portrait (1953), Man in Blue V (1954) and Man in Blue (1954). Other paintings in the room focus on the animalistic tendencies in the human to mate—Two Figures in the Grass (1954) and cry—Chimpanzee (1955). The black backgrounds overwhelm and engulf the viewer, bringing with it a sense of doubt, despair and apprehension, which characterizes the atmosphere of the room. This apprehension is translated into real fear in Room 4: Crucifixion. If Room 3 can be described as encapsulating the anticipation and limbo-state of modern man, then the fears are actualized in Room 4. The fear and aggression evidenced in the screams and cries of so many of the earlier figures are now taken a step further in the crucifixions, as we see the mechanisms of torture: from the figures who are tortured to the torturers themselves. The crucifixions In his interviews and written statements Bacon denied using the symbol of the crucifixion in a Christian way to support a particular faith. Among © Equinox Publishing Ltd. 2009

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his many explanations he suggested that the crucifixion operated as an armature, which enabled him to explore human relationships and the behaviour of one human to another (Sylvester 1993, 44). The crucifixion revealed the cruelty and violence of human interaction. In three of the four crucifixion images that feature here, Crucifixion (1933), Three Studies for a Crucifixion (1962) and Crucifixion (1965), at least one figure looks as if it is being crucified. Comparisons are made between Christ on the Cross, which is well represented in the history of art, and the figure on a cross in a generic crucifixion. In Three Studies for a Crucifixion Bacon makes the connection, between the figure in the right hand panel and Cimabue’s Crucifixion 1272–1274, explicit. He states, of the representation of the Christ figure in Cimabue: “I always think of that as an image—as a worm crawling down the cross. I did try to make something of the feeling which I’ve sometimes had from that picture of this image just moving, undulating down the cross” (Sylvester 1993, 14). The interplay of brutality in Bacon’s crucifixions, as seen by the bloodshed of the figures on the cross, or the perpetrators of the act, such as in Second Version of Triptych 1944, and Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion (1944) reinforces the sacrificial dimensions of the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, and the concomitant religious feelings that this act symbolizes. The viewer is indirectly made aware of the ramifications of this act, even if they do not subscribe to the faith. The symbol of the crucifixion, which has been banalized and sanitized, now takes on a renewed sense of aesthetic and spiritual focus. The irony is that Bacon may be vehemently atheistic, but by continually referring to the crucifixion he is drawing attention to the very tradition he denies. His atheistic stance is dependent on the affirmation of theism in the first place. In the Godless world of Bacon’s generation, the propensity for violence and brutality is given a sharper focus and these sentiments are expressed in Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion (1944). This painting is comprised of three strange figures separated into three panels with each figure on a podium and placed against a burnt orange background. It has already been referred to in Second Version of Triptych 1944, which as the title suggests was clearly influenced by this earlier triptych. Three Studies was painted in 1944 and exhibited for the first time at the Lefevre Gallery in 1945. This is now regarded as a seminal painting because it established Bacon into the art world. The art critic John Russell described this work as causing “a total consternation” (Russell 1993, 10–11). In contrast to the other exhibits in the 1945 show, Bacon’s contribution was regarded warily and offered a vision that many would have preferred to put © Equinox Publishing Ltd. 2009

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behind them. Instead of deflecting or distracting the focus from post-war malaise, Bacon fixed the focus entirely on suffering, pain and despair, which these three figures articulate. These Tiresian figures are prophets of eternal doom. They cannot see and we are placed in this space to see what is in front of us. These figures, like the figures in the Second Version forty years later, are incomprehensible forms that defy easy classification. They have qualities that are unmistakably human and also animal/bird-like. In the earlier example, it becomes apparent that the reference to the crucifixion in the title is not reflected in the image itself—the crucifixion is absent. Furthermore, contrary to one’s immediate reflection on the title, we are not looking at the, but at a, crucifixion (Russell 1993, 11). The use of the indefinite article alters the potential meaning of the work, and may provide explanations for his repeated use of the symbol. Bacon is discussing the crucifixion in a more generic sense. Given the political context of post-war Europe, it is plausible that this is a statement on the violence of wartime, but also more banally in day-to-day living. In his interviews with Sylvester Bacon spoke of the pervasive sense of violence that he felt he lived with (Sylvester 1993, 81–82). His background and early childhood were certainly tumultuous. His early memories were of upheaval due to the First World World. He also experienced the Blitz of the Second World War and the Irish Civil War (growing up as a Protestant in Catholic Ireland). The presence of Second Version of Triptych 1944 on the way into Room 1 is a reminder of the monumental effects that the earlier “version,” Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, had on its viewers and singles this motif out as being amongst the most powerful in Bacon’s oeuvre. If the 1944 example established Bacon in the art world, then this second version undoubtedly consolidated his reputation. One possible attribution of the figures in the 1944 example is that of the Furies who seek eternal justice and hunt down wrongdoers. These Furies stalk us on our journey through the exhibition from room to room and appear in different guises. The main themes reflected in the exhibition are Bacon’s preconception with the human form and the ontological questions about the status and place of the human being in the late twentieth century. In all his depictions, whether of anonymous and generic figures who epitomise the human condition, or in more specific studies of his friends in the portraits (the subject of Room 7), Bacon examines the mortality of the flesh and the proximity between life and death. These concerns are revisited in the final room, Room 10: Late. In these later works, which Bacon painted when he was in his seventies, he is seen facing up to his mortality. The disintegra© Equinox Publishing Ltd. 2009

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tion or dissolution of figures’ heads and the palpability of the shadows (of death) in Triptych (1983) reveal the workings of death. Religious musings Interpretations of the religious content and sensibility of Bacon’s work are often thwarted in Bacon scholarship. Many defer to the endless statements that he made about his virulent atheistic stance. They interpret his use of the religious images as formal devices, which allowed him to explore aspects of human nature, but they do not concede a religious explanation of behaviour. I argue that his attitude to religion was problematic, but we can speak of the implicit religion in his work. His images do not support a theological tradition and hence cannot be described as explicit, but they do engage in theological debates and speak of existence in a Godless world. God is featured as a palpably absent presence: the grimace of a biomorphic form, a shadow that overspills a body, the numerous dark, black abyssal backgrounds. Bacon dealt with the primary themes about the meaning and purpose of existence by examining the mortality of the flesh and the intricacies of human behaviour. In the absence of any of the religious structures of the afterlife, his figures are left contemplating the void. The reflecting surfaces of the glass, coupled with the spatial inclusion of the triptych devices pulls the viewer in. We see our reflections in the glass and are variously positioned in a cage, at the base of a crucifixion and in a background where we find no familiarity and hence no solace. The Godless world is not a myth that is narrated to us but something that we are confronted with in the very fabric of the work. I walked around the rooms sometimes following the rooms in sequence and at other times backtracking. The gravitas of the first image preyed on my mind and became weighted down by other similar images of distortion and degeneration. Bacon is inescapably imparting a message about the human condition that is pessimistic insofar as it makes us engage with our mortality and transient position in the world but it is also uplifting because it is energizing and has an urgency and immediacy that makes us rethink our place in the world. I walked away feeling that I had experienced a narrative of the evolution of the human which turns back in on itself thus revealing the animal in the human. Somehow this did not feel stultifying but progressive and paradoxical. Through his sophisticated pictorial technique Bacon takes the viewer back to the natural body, which is undone of all its cultural fetters, and we experience it in all its spasmodic ways. © Equinox Publishing Ltd. 2009

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Critical appraisal The arrangement of the paintings enabled the amateur to make sense of the broad themes of Bacon’s oeuvre, and, for the more accomplished viewer, to trace the development of Bacon’s style and technique. Whilst the division into named rooms is interesting, it might have been valuable to make more thematic comparisons. Bacon was a painter who emphasised the importance of process and the influence that chance exerted in his work. However, this was not adequately conveyed in the selection of images. The curators deliberately chose his masterpieces but it might have been an interesting contrast to see lesser works, whether in development or technique, in order to make the adjustment. The array of works was at times simply too much to take in, and certainly so for one visit, but when I considered the volume of work against the purpose of the show—a retrospective and a commemoration of his centenary—then I began to revise my opinion. The earliest wall text states that philosophical notions run through the exhibition like a spine, but there was a dearth of philosophical commentary to bolster the images, or rather the wall texts did not provide adequate information. This could be construed positively, to make the case that the power of Bacon’s paintings is such that they can speak for themselves and do not require texts to impart meaning. Another apparent mismatch between intention and delivery was the presence of Room 6: Archive. In 1998, John Edwards (Bacon’s former lover) gave the contents of Bacon’s studio and living space at 7 Reece Mews (in South Kensington) to the Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin. An incredible amount of source material, preparatory sketches, photographs etc was unearthed in the reconstruction and transplantation from the first to the second site. Room 6 chronicled the posthumous investigation of Bacon’s studio. This body of sources was revelatory because it gave us important information about Bacon’s working processes and modus operandi. In his statements and articulations of the brush on canvas it would appear that Bacon utilized the role of chance in his work, the accidental mark. The virtuosity of his brushwork in the examples of images from Room 1 to 5 certainly indicated this. The archival material presented here revealed the mismatch between Bacon’s statements and his actual practice, as it was revealed from photographic and other sources that he did preparatory paintings. The evidence here to a greater or lesser extent undermines his professions of spontaneity, the role he awarded to chance and intuition. © Equinox Publishing Ltd. 2009

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Whilst I understand the significance of this archive material both in authenticating Bacon’s method of working and also as contributing to Bacon scholarship, I feel that it was poorly placed here. It was deeply idiosyncratic and strange to go from Room 5: Crisis, to the orderliness of the archive. It interrupted the flow of being absorbed in the depth of his visions to having suddenly to retract from those recesses to a stark room filled with a proliferation of images and sanitized glass cases containing source material. The wealth of material was tremendous and had been classified with astonishing precision. But it would have been well placed in an adjunct room, or at the beginning or end of the journey. The experience of the subsequent rooms represented a deviation from Rooms 1 to 5 and invoked a more critical perspective on Bacon’s intentions. Bacon left an indelible mark on my imagination when I first discovered his work in 1998 and this exhibition bears testimony to this great artist. In spite of the familiarity of individual pieces of his work, which fetch millions at auction houses, and the growing trend of contemporary artists to explore distortion and the grotesque, Bacon’s art still has the power to wound and strike the nervous sensibilities of the viewer. In his engagement with the pain and suffering of the mortal condition, his portrayal of the evil in humankind, of the reality of the death of God and the subsequent redundancy of the symbol of the Pope in the contemporary age, Bacon can be said to be working out problems that are resolutely religious. He was a militant atheist who was haunted by the presence that the absent-God exerted in the world.

please place note in text

Note 1.

In the catalogue accompanying the exhibition Second Version of Triptych 1944, 1988 is featured as the tail end of Room 10: Late. However, we actually see the painting before we enter Room 1.

References page refs?

Gale, M. 2008. “Zone.” In Francis Bacon, edited by M. Gale and C. Stephens, xx-xx. London: Tate Publishing. Russell, J. 1993. Francis Bacon. London: Thames and Hudson. Sylvester, D. 1993. The Brutality of Fact: Interviews with Francis Bacon. London: Thames and Hudson.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd. 2009

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