Garden, Notting Hill Gate 1997

Lucian Freud, born in Berlin but working in Britain, made this painting called *Garden, Notting Hill Gate.* Freud, grandson of Sigmund, lived through the turmoil of the twentieth century, fleeing Nazi Germany with his family. Maybe that's why this garden scene feels so enclosed, a private world of dense greenery. You can almost feel the humid air, the weight of leaves pressing in. Freud was known for his intense, unflinching portraits, often of people he knew intimately. While this painting lacks a human figure, it shares that same quality of close observation and a kind of raw honesty. There’s nothing romantic or idealized here. We are seeing the garden as a space that is maybe overgrown. It reminds us that even in the most cultivated spaces, nature has its own wild, unruly power. What does it mean for a painter known for his portraits to turn his gaze on a garden? Maybe it’s a way of seeing the self reflected in the natural world, or finding a different kind of intimacy in the dense, green world.