Description

In 1964 Lucian Freud set his students at the Norwich College of Art an assignment: to paint naked self-portraits and to make them ‘revealing, telling, believable… really shameless’. It was advice that the artist was often to follow himself. Visceral, unflinching and often nude, Freud’s self-portraits give us an insight into the development of his style as a painter. The works provide the viewer with a constant reminder of the artist’s overwhelming presence, whether he is confronting the viewer directly or only present as a shadow or in a reflection. Essays by leading authorities – including those who knew him – explore Freud’s life and work, and analyse the importance of self-portraiture in his practice. An interview between the art historian Jasper Sharp and the actress Tilda Swinton completes the book. Swinton sat for Freud and can testify to the intensity with which he studied the human body – an intensity that he maintained when studying his own. Accompanies an exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts, London (27 October 2019 to 26 January 2020) and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (22 February to 25 May 2020). Exhibition organised by the Royal Academy of Arts, London, in collaboration with the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. AUTHORS: David Dawson is a painter and photographer, and Freud’s former studio assistant. Joseph Leo Koerner is Victor S. Thomas Professor of Art and Architecture at Harvard University. Jasper Sharp is Adjunct Curator for Modern and Contemporary Art at the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. The Pulitzer Prize-winning art critic Sebastian Smee is author of The Art of Rivalry: Four Friendships, Betrayals and Breakthroughs in Modern Art (2016). SELLING POINTS: . Lucian Freud’s arresting self-portraits provide an insight into the enigmatic artist’s psyche and document his developing style . This book reproduces all of Freud’s self-portraits 130 colour illustrations