Bella in her Pluto T-Shirt 1995

Lucian Freud made this etching, Bella in her Pluto T-Shirt, using a painstaking printmaking process. Think about the labor involved. Freud would have used a sharp needle to draw the image into a metal plate coated with wax, then submerged the plate in acid. The acid bites into the exposed metal, creating the lines that hold ink. After the plate is inked and wiped, it’s pressed onto paper with immense pressure. Notice the density of the marks, built up through countless passes of the needle. The subject, Bella, is wearing a mass-produced t-shirt, adorned with Pluto, a Disney character. The contrast between her everyday attire and the labor-intensive, traditional printmaking process is striking. The image subtly addresses the tension between mass culture and the artist's hand, questioning distinctions between high art and the everyday. The image is not just a portrait, but a meditation on materials, making, and the world around us.