House of pain …
This is one of Bacon’s most acclaimed but little-seen paintings. It was created at the cottage of his violent ex-fighter pilot boyfriend, Peter Lacy, where, according to biographer John Richardson, the artist spent a lot of time in bondage.
Brute force …
Bacon’s classic mix of sex, death and animal instincts explodes directly through the buzzing vertical lines, the corpse-blue flesh and rictus of pleasure and pain.
Fight club …
The sadomasochistic pose was apparently inspired by wrestling magazines. But that interpretation might have been a Trojan horse for a work made when gay sex was illegal and in the news.
Sex crime …
The quaint antique bed and black, curtained box of a room offer a defiant message to its audience, too. This is less a private boudoir than a triumphantly sordid theatre. The couple stare down their onlookers, grimacing at them. Manet’s Olympia – a reclining but far from traditionally demure nude prostitute – is the ghost in the room.
Part of Francis Bacon: Couplings, Gagosian Gallery, Grosvenor Hill, to 3 August
