When discussing Francis Bacon, it’s important not to confuse the 16th- and 17th-century English statesman and philosopher with the British painter. It is this second Francis Bacon that LEC is focusing on today, as part of your language study trip to Ireland—after all, the artist was born in Dublin exactly 105 yearsago today!
Follow in the footsteps of the painter with a language study trip to Ireland… England, and Germany
Although he was born on the Emerald Isle—which you’ll have plenty of time to explore during a language study trip to Ireland with LEC— Francis Bacon’s parents were English. He realized he was gay at age 15: rejected by his father, he left his hometown to go into exile in London, and then in Berlin, during the latter half of the 1920s.
Francis Bacon Discovers Himself
After discovering Expressionism in Germany, he moved to Paris, where he experienced another aesthetic revelation upon encountering Picasso’s works. Returning to the British capital in 1929, he initially worked as an interior designer before turning to watercolors and oil paintings. Deeply inspired by cinematic techniques, particularly the use of storyboards, Francis Bacon also adapted the visual and emotional techniques derived from contemporary aesthetics—from Expressionism to Minimal Art—for his own artistic purposes.
A selection of works by Francis Bacon from around the world
Among the works by Francis Bacon worth exploring during a language study trip to Ireland or elsewhere are:
- Head II, Belfast
- Figure with Meat, Chicago
- Landscape, Milan