Francis Bacon: Closer
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Francis Bacon famously resisted explaining his work, often claiming not to know what it meant. Yet this refusal has tended to discourage close looking, with critics favouring theoretical abstraction or biographical interpretation instead.
Francis Bacon: Closer sets out to reverse that tendency. Rather than reducing Bacon’s imagery to familiar tropes – violence, distortion, the ‘screaming popes’ – it explores the variety and complexity of his visual language. The book centres on detailed studies of eighty paintings, organized around motifs such as heads, mouths, wounds, pigment and abstraction, revealing the anatomical and psychological preoccupations embedded in the work. While aimed at scholars, it will also appeal to anyone interested in how Bacon’s paintings were made and what they mean.
Francis Bacon: Closer sets out to reverse that tendency. Rather than reducing Bacon’s imagery to familiar tropes – violence, distortion, the ‘screaming popes’ – it explores the variety and complexity of his visual language. The book centres on detailed studies of eighty paintings, organized around motifs such as heads, mouths, wounds, pigment and abstraction, revealing the anatomical and psychological preoccupations embedded in the work. While aimed at scholars, it will also appeal to anyone interested in how Bacon’s paintings were made and what they mean.
Extent: 208 pp
Format: Hardback
Illustrations: 200
Publication date: 2026-11-12
Size: 31.0 x 25.0 cm
ISBN: 9780500966617
Format: Hardback
Illustrations: 200
Publication date: 2026-11-12
Size: 31.0 x 25.0 cm
ISBN: 9780500966617
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About the Author
Martin Harrison is one of the foremost scholars of Francis Bacon, and the editor of Francis Bacon: Catalogue Raisonné.
Sophie Pretorius is Archivist of the Bacon Estate’s collection.
Brian McLaughlin is an independent paintings conservator who has been working with The Estate of Francis Bacon since 2016.