Bacon was mostly self-taught. He left home at sixteen after his father, a horse trainer, caught him trying on his mother's underwear and threw him out. He drifted through Berlin and Paris in the late 1920s, saw a Picasso exhibition that shook him, and decided to paint. He had no training beyond a few weeks at a design school. He worked as an interior decorator and furniture designer to pay the bills.
Key facts
Biography
His career started late and badly. A 1934 exhibition was dismissed. He destroyed most of his early work. The painting that changed things was Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, shown in London in April 1945, days before the liberation of the concentration camps. The three figures are part-human, part-animal, contorted and screaming. People found them unbearable. That was the reaction he wanted.
He painted from photographs, not life. He used images of Velazquez's Pope Innocent X, Muybridge's motion studies, medical textbooks, and photos of friends and lovers. The faces are smeared, caged, dissolved. The bodies sit in featureless rooms on bare furniture. The backgrounds are flat blocks of colour. He applied paint with rags, sponges, and his hands as much as with brushes, building and destroying the surface until something emerged that looked both accidental and inevitable.
He was an alcoholic and a gambler. He lived in a small, chaotic studio in South Kensington that was knee-deep in photographs, brushes, books, and paint-smeared surfaces. After his death the entire studio was removed and reconstructed in the Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin, preserved exactly as he left it. He was born in Dublin to English parents, which made him Irish enough for Ireland to claim the studio.
Timeline
- 1909Born in Dublin, Ireland, to English parents. His father was a racehorse trainer, and Bacon spent his childhood moving between Ireland and England.
- 1927At 17, travelled to Berlin and Paris after being expelled from home at 16. An exhibition of Picasso's work at the Galerie Paul Rosenberg in Paris inspired him to take up painting.
- 1944At 34, completed Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, a triptych exhibited at the Lefevre Gallery in London that sealed his reputation as a painter of visceral, unsettling power.
- 1949At 40, began his series of Screaming Popes, reinterpreting Velazquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X as a figure trapped behind transparent curtains, screaming into the void. The series continued into the mid-1950s.
- 1958At 48, signed with Marlborough Fine Art in London, which remained his sole dealer for the rest of his life. The gallery advanced him funds against current and future paintings.
- 1962At 52, the Tate Gallery in London mounted a major retrospective of his work. Around this time his painting shifted towards portraits of friends and drinking companions, often as diptychs or triptychs.
- 1971At 62, his companion George Dyer died of an overdose in their Paris hotel room, two days before the opening of Bacon's retrospective at the Grand Palais. The tragedy haunted his later paintings for years.
- 1992Died in Madrid, Spain, at 82, while on holiday. He left his entire estate to his companion John Edwards. His chaotic Reece Mews studio was later relocated to the Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin.
Notable Works
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Where to See Francis Bacon
32 museums worldwide.
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3 works
National Gallery
Trafalgar Square, United Kingdom
Related Artists
Frequently Asked Questions
Did francis bacon believe in god?
The biography and passages provided do not contain information about Francis Bacon's religious beliefs.Francis bacon art style name?
The biography and passages provided do not name Francis Bacon's art style, but his paintings often featured smudged paint and distorted human figures.Is francis bacon a contemporary artist?
In 1945, Francis Bacon's arrival reawakened British art.What is francis bacon most famous for?
The biography does not mention what Francis Bacon is most famous for, but it does state that his 1945 painting, Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, made him well-known.When did francis bacon live?
Francis Bacon lived from 1909 to 1992.Where can i see francis bacon paintings?
Francis Bacon's works can be seen at Sainsbury Centre, Tate, Museum of Modern Art, and 2 other museums worldwide.Why did francis bacon die?
Francis Bacon died in 1992 at the age of 83.Why did francis bacon paint the pope?
Francis Bacon painted images of Velazquez's Pope Innocent X, but the biography does not specify why he painted the Pope.How did francis bacon artist die?
Francis Bacon died in 1992 at the age of 83.Is francis bacon still alive?
No, Francis Bacon died in 1992.
Sources
Editorial draws on the following primary and tertiary references for Francis Bacon.
- [1] museum Buffalo AKG Art Museum Used for: museum holdings.
- [2] museum Kunsthalle Mannheim Used for: museum holdings.
- [3] museum Städel Museum Used for: museum holdings.
- [4] museum Van Abbemuseum Used for: museum holdings.
- [5] museum Ulster Museum Used for: museum holdings.
- [6] museum National Galleries Scotland Used for: museum holdings.
- [7] book guggenheim-guhe00solo Used for: biography.
- [8] book guggenheim-handboo00pegg Used for: biography.
- [9] book Carol Strickland and John Boswell, The Annotated Mona Lisa _ba crash course in art history from prehistoric to post-modern _cCarol Strickland and John Boswell Used for: biography.
Editorial overseen by Solis Prints. Sources verified 2026-05-31. Click a source for details, or hover over [N] in the page above to preview.
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