By Ally Crossland
Nowadays, the
British public are bombarded with the Lucian Freud image. His portraits seem to
be everywhere, making a big splash in the exhibition world as well as the
auction houses. The National Portrait Gallery’s blockbuster Lucian Freud Portraits has certainly
drawn in the crowds. In fact it has been the galleries most successful show
ever, receiving over 175,000 visitors through its doors. Its popularity has no
doubt been helped by a visit from the ever glamorous and on trend Duchess of
Cambridge. Freud has long been seen as the saviour of British Art, one of the
most revolutionary artists for generations. Some claim the hype of the Lucian
Freud brand has outshone the brilliance of his raw and uncompromising talent. Others
feel, as one online sources comments, that Freud was an ‘ugly painter, of ugly
people’.
Yet, in my
humble opinion, no better accomplished and talented artist could have been
given the honour of almost the entire lower floor of the National Portrait
Gallery, in which to hang perhaps the most important retrospectives of the last
few years. Possibly not since the Francis Bacon exhibition at the Tate in 2008
has such an important retrospective focused on the work of one British artist
working in the twenty-first century.
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| Freud's early portrait of his first wife Kitty |
From the
exquisitely detailed portraits of his youth, with electrically charged eyes and
doleful expressions, Freud showed prolific talent. As an artist his penetrative
gaze allowed him to access the inner qualities of the sitter. He revealed the
secrets about them that they would rather keep hidden, laid bare and
uncompromised on the canvas.
In Freud’s later
portraits he did away with any pretence of formality, stripping the sitter to the
bare bones and flesh that make up what it is to be human. Whether clothed or
nude, Freud’s sitters are depicted in the most brutal yet sensitive way. Contorted
into uncomfortable positions, their faces un-idealised, mournful and pensive,
Freud’s sitters reflect real people and emotions that can be seen and felt in
today’s world.
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| Life model Sue Tilley and 'Benefits Supervisor Sleeping' |
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| Two of Freud's last portraits, with 'Portrait with Hound' 2011 on the right |
The bodies in
Freud’s portraits become swathes of raw pigment forced onto the canvas. Faces are
contorted by age or an inner complexity that will never be fully realised by
the spectator. What Freud achieves is a realness that other portraitists would
never dare to address. He claims the subject for himself and enters into a
relationship with the sitter, part trust and part animal attraction. His later
works, even the painting Portrait with
Hound, painted up until Freud’s death in 2011, shares this same brutal
honestly. Yet it is also beautifully poignant. This unfinished portrait
finishes mid-sentence, leaving the spectator to fill in the blanks. In a sense
this is quite apart from the rest of the exhibition, which successfully depicts
all the different stages of Freud’s life through his paintings. The paintings,
which so define Freud’s life, speak for themselves, and in my opinion find a
voice within the walls of the National Portrait Gallery. They may be ‘ugly’,
but in the same breath they are truly exquisite reflections of the very real
people that made up Freud’s world.
Lucian Freud Portraits runs at the National Portrait Gallery until the 27th May 2012.Admission £14. Concessions £13 / £12 With Gift Aid (includes voluntary Gift Aid donation of 10% above standard price): Admission £15.40. Concessions £14.30/£13.20
