Lucian freud prints biography for kids

Lucian freud art style

Lucian Freud, renowned for his unflinching observations of anatomy and psychology, made even the beautiful people including Kate Moss look ugly. One of the late twentieth-century's most celebrated portraitists, Freud painted only those closest to him: friends and family, wives and mistresses, and, last but not least, himself. His insightful series of self-portraits spanned over six decades.

Unusual among artists with such long careers, his style remained remarkably consistent.

Lucian freud self-portrait

Perhaps inevitably, the psychic intensity of his portraits, and his notoriously long sessions with sitters have been compared with the psychoanalytic practice of his famous grandfather, Sigmund Freud. Typical of Freud's early period, Girl with a White Dog was created using a sable brush, which he used to apply the paint with linear precision, almost like a drawing.

The subtle shading evokes a host of textures exuding softness, warmth, and the absence of immediate tension. The robe has slipped off the sitter's shoulder, exposing her right breast. Coupled with the absent stare of the woman and the dog, the muted colors and faint contours give this composition an overall flatness. The sitter is Kitty Garman, Freud's first wife, and a noted beauty whose father was artist Jacob Epstein.

The dog was one of two bull terriers they were given as a wedding gift. Freud painted many portraits of Kitty during their brief marriage, which ended in divorce in , due to his chronic infidelities. A weariness in the sitter's expression, the deep hollows under her eyes and the self-supporting gesture of the hand under the left breast hint at her discontent, despite this moment of calm.

The analytic distance that came to characterize Freud's brilliance as an observer is reinforced by the absence of a name in the title, despite his intimate connection to the subjects. He was able to see certain things better because he remained aloof. Settling in Paris in , Freud painted many portraits, including Hotel Bedroom , which features a woman lying in a bed with white sheets pulled up to her shoulders.

Her left hand rests on her cheek, and her gaze is fixed on a faraway place.