Three Studies for Portrait of Isabel Rawsthorne 1968

Editor: We're looking at Francis Bacon's "Three Studies for Portrait of Isabel Rawsthorne," created in 1968 using oil paint. The triptych format feels almost like fragmented memories. It’s unsettling, definitely expressionistic. What do you see, looking at these faces? Curator: Ah, Isabel. Bacon and Rawsthorne had quite a tangled relationship. A muse, a sparring partner, a fellow traveler in the darker corners of the soul, perhaps? He tears at her image, doesn’t he? Or, more accurately, allows her image to tear at itself, right before our very eyes. Almost like an exploration into identity, into how identity can be something so fluid and terrifying. He seems intent on not simply capturing a likeness, but on capturing the very essence, or the absence thereof, that lurks beneath the surface. Ever feel like a stranger in your own skin? I think Bacon understood that feeling intrinsically. Editor: Absolutely. The way he distorts her features, it's as though he's trying to excavate something hidden, but in a violent way. Do you think it speaks to a particular unease he felt about his subjects, or even himself? Curator: Bacon certainly wasn't afraid of the ugly. Or perhaps he had simply a clearer view on the reality of our existence? That beauty and ugliness, truth and lies are all, always intertwined. He’s peeling back the layers of politeness, social conditioning. You can almost hear the scream trapped within those brushstrokes. Editor: It’s amazing how much emotion comes through even with such… viscerally distorted portraits. I hadn't considered how deliberately he seems to work with the interplay between raw emotion and calculated, aesthetic choices. Curator: Yes, and it’s in that space, that unsettling meeting of intention and execution, that Bacon truly gets under our skin. It's definitely haunting. Food for thought indeed!