Francis Bacon: The Human Body

by David Sylvester

Book Overview

Francis Bacon (1909-1992) is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest British artists of this century. For over fifty years the intense emotions conveyed in his works have shocked and enthralled an... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1853321753
• ISBN13: 9781853321757
• Release Date: January 1999
• Publisher: Hayward Gallery Publishing
• Length: 101 Pages
• Weight: 1.55 lbs.

Customer Reviews

For inspiration

Not so long before I had no idea of who Bacon was and what he painted. Remember how I once skipped lectures in university and played PSX game Silent Hill all day along. In Making OF of this game I first time heard that some art inspiration for game was taken from Bacon paintings. And so I came to Bacon and his art :) Personally for me, and again just for me, I gave this book 5 stars because pictures here catch my eye like none art before. Bacons pictures by some reason looks stunning and scary at the same time. This book contains his pictures of human body theme only, as a cover says. I liked the way author gone - less text, more pictures. Second half of the book is containing just paintings with minimum comments below, mainly one paint picture on whole page. There are also few "three page rollout" inserts, showing few Bacon's triptych paintings which I liked. Pictures of second half is fully colourfull, first half of the book contains one page for text and other page for black and white, zoomed in picture of Bacon, that gives kinda cool look. This book will gave it's best to filmmakers, animators, concept artists, scriptwriters, Bacon enthusiasts who seek to take inspiration for horror art, movies, animations, whatever.

A marriage of words and paintings

David Sylvester is one of the finest biographers of contemporary painters on the shelves today. His insights into such obtuse minds as Giocomettti and de Kooning and Francis Bacon have brought us, the viewer and thinker, closer to the real synapses at work. In this lavishly illustrated catalogue the emphasis is on the whole human body - alone, in confined spaces, distorted and reassembled in triptychs. Sylvester opens this format with terse discussions about particular paintings, using only black and white details of the works he is discussing. Then, once we have the groundwork established, the last half of the book is simply the paintings, printed on the finest peper, with foldouts that do justice to the triptychs and color separations that are as near to the originals as is possible. A feast for the eyes and mind....and imagination.