STUDY FROM THE HUMAN BODY, 1991

  • Study from the Human Body, 1991, Francis Bacon

    Study from the Human Body, 1991

    Oil, pastel and aerosol paint on canvas, 198 x 147.7cm

    ©The Estate of Francis Bacon, image reproduced for informational purposes only. 

    Study from the Human Body, 1991, is one of Francis Bacon’s final works, created just a year before his death. It reflects his lifelong fascination with the fragility, tension and distortion of the human form. The figure appears twisted within a shallow, undefined space, its flesh rendered in subdued pinks, greys and ivory tones that suggest both vitality and decay.
     
    The painting’s restrained colour palette against Bacon's signature pop of orange and sparse composition reveals the calm precision that characterised Bacon’s final years. By this point, the violence of his earlier works had given way to something quieter but no less unsettling. The body, stripped of context, becomes pure sensation, the trace of life on the verge of disappearance. Study from the Human Body captures Bacon’s final statement on existence: a vision of humanity suspended between creation and extinction.

  • You could say that I have no inspiration, that I only need to paint.

    - Francis Bacon

    Francis Bacon died on 28 April 1992 in Madrid, aged 82, after suffering a heart attack brought on by respiratory failure. He had travelled there to visit a close friend, José Capelo, a Spanish banker who had become a late companion and confidant. Despite declining health from years of heavy drinking and smoking, Bacon continued painting until the very end, producing some of his most reflective and restrained works in the final years of his life.