STUDY FOR SELF-PORTRAIT, 1982

  • Study for Self-Portrait (1982) is a lithograph produced in an edition of 182, measuring 94 × 65 cm. Against a...
    Study for Self-Portrait 1982, 1982
    Lithograph, Edition size 182, H 94 x W 65cm. 
    ©The Estate of Francis Bacon
    Study for Self-Portrait (1982) is a lithograph produced in an edition of 182, measuring 94 × 65 cm. Against a cool blue background, Francis Bacon presents himself in equally muted tones. The absence of warmth in both colour and composition creates a feeling of detachment and stillness, a visual quiet that stands in stark contrast to the intensity of his earlier self-portraits.
     
    This work belongs to Bacon’s late series of self-examinations, created after the deaths of many of his closest companions. The blue tones lend the image a spectral quality, suggesting both physical decline and emotional withdrawal. More than a likeness, it feels like a meditation on presence fading into absence, a confrontation with the inevitability of death and the slow erasure of the self. In Study for Self-Portrait (1982), Bacon turns the act of self-portraiture into a reflection on mortality.
     
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  • If I didn’t have to live, I’d never let any of it out.

     

    - Francis Bacon

    Francis Bacon’s self-portraits form one of the most revealing and significant threads in his career. Between the 1960s and his death in 1992, he returned to his own image repeatedly, often saying that he had “no one else left to paint.” These works were not attempts at likeness in the traditional sense, but psychological studies, fragmented, distorted reflections of a man confronting time, loss, and the inevitability of death.
    Bacon’s self-portraits vary in tone and composition, but many share common features: a close-cropped head, minimal background, and the play of light and shadow across a violently reworked face.