Painting 1946

Painting is a large work that has come to be recognized as one of Francis Bacon's masterpieces. Flesh is a major part of the work, which went on to become a central theme throughout the rest of his career. Even his portraits took on the appearence of flesh that could just as easily be hanging in a butcher shop.

In an interview, Francis Bacon said the following about his 1946 painting "It came to me as an accident. I was attempting to make a bird alighting on a field. And it may have been bound up in some way with the three forms that had gone before, but suddenly the line that I had drawn suggested something totally different and out of this suggestion arose this picture. I had no intention to do this picture; I never thought of it in that way. It was like one continuous accident mounting on top of another."