Seated Figure 1977

Editor: This is Francis Bacon’s "Seated Figure," painted in 1977. It's oil on canvas. I find the distorted figure unsettling, but the focus on raw flesh is captivating. What do you make of it? Curator: Considering Bacon's process is crucial here. The oil paint itself becomes the skin, doesn't it? The application, the layering, the violent brushstrokes—these aren't just techniques, they *are* the subject. Think about the labor involved. Bacon wasn't just depicting suffering, he was *performing* it through his very method of creation. The dark backdrop, stark lighting, almost stage-like presentation—all call attention to this idea of visibility and spectatorship as labor, and its relationship to social alienation. Does the medium amplify or contradict what we typically understand portraiture to represent? Editor: That's a fascinating point, the performative aspect. And it makes me think about the reference to newspapers on the lower platform of the composition. What would it have meant for him, or even us, to encounter fragments of what appear to be textual fragments with the stark letters "NON" bleeding in red ink into the figure and the canvas overall? Curator: Absolutely. These found materials incorporated into the scene disrupt the presumed fixity of representation, bringing an external, often unacknowledged voice, to the piece, creating dialogue of interior versus external, self-presentation against one’s place in culture as determined by the press. How does that material and its inscription "NON" interrupt your reading of this Seated Figure? Editor: I see it now. The "NON" and the newsprint fragments inject this external world of information and opinion, literally printed matter, into the scene and disrupt, as you suggested, an assumed stable idea of self. So, it’s not just about the distorted figure but also about the material conditions and external factors shaping that existence. It sounds like this figure is caught up within larger systems of production, information, circulation. Curator: Exactly. It goes beyond just visual representation to incorporate material realities and external elements affecting subjectivities. By focusing on the physical act of painting and the incorporated materials, Bacon reveals not just the internal experience, but labor processes that impact identities and its articulation or lack thereof. Editor: Thank you. I'll certainly be keeping a closer eye on Bacon’s process from now on.