In the middle of the sitting there was a knock at the door. A beautiful woman entered the studio. She did not say a word but went straight to the bathroom. The Grand Painter followed the young woman. He would be back in a few minutes. Then, there was the sound of people having sex behind the bathroom door. After a bath, the painter returned naked to the studio and continued painting.

     Lucian Freud (1922–2011)—the genius painter and elegant enfant terrible—thrived on sex, he needed it as a source of inspiration, to focus on the only thing he ever wanted to do: Painting.

     Born in the Berlin of the Weimar Republic, Lucian Freud grew up in a bourgeois home in the exclusive Tiergarten district. His father, Ernst, was an architect; his mother, Lucie, a classics graduate. It was very early in life that Lucian started drawing. At age four, he would be asked by his mother to draw for her friends. 

Lucian Freud, And the Bridegroom (1993) © The Lucian Freud Archive / The Bridgeman Art Library

Lucian Freud, And the Bridegroom (1993)
© The Lucian Freud Archive / The Bridgeman Art Library

     As a boy, Lucian was given reproductions of Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s The Series of the Months (1565) by his grandfather Sigmund Freud. Bruegel and certain other Netherlandish Old Masters would hold a lifelong fascination for Lucian Freud. He would regularly visit historical museums and was eager to learn from the Old Masters.

     Shortly after the rise of Nazism, Lucian and his family left Berlin for London. The boy soon identified with his new homeland, Great Britain. Yet, his Austro-German background and culture remained part of his identity. As a grown man, Freud frequently cited Goethe—he had a fondness for Wilhelm Busch’s caricatures—and when speaking English there was always his German accent, which was dramatic, very guttural and individual.

     Pursuing a career as a painter, Freud refused to be part of any art movement. He stressed his individual development and wanted to break new ground with his desire to portray humans as animals in an unsentimental approach.

     Freud painted seven days a week, 18 hours a day. He examined his models, ruthlessly inspected and exhausted them, for months, sometimes even for years. He did not want to paint them the way they looked, but who they were. Yet, Freud never narrated a story. It was the mere flesh—the animal being he was interested in.

     The artist rarely accepted a commission; Freud chose whom he wanted to paint. Thus, he painted those who were close to him, in rooms he lived in, rooms he knew. His portraits show his many lovers, family members, or chance encounters with his oversized model, Big Sue, and the shrill performance artist Leigh Bowery.

     And the Bridegroom (1993) depicts Bowery and his costume designer and close friend Nicola Bateman. This painting is one of Freud’s most gentle works. The couple lies in bed, sleeping side by side; they are naked and deprived of their clothes and social markers. 

Lucian Freud, Working at Night (2005) © David Dawson, courtesy of Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert

Lucian Freud, Working at Night (2005)
© David Dawson, courtesy of Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert

     Throughout his career, Freud constantly returned to the concept of self-portrait, struggling with the presentation of himself. In an ongoing process Freud studied the effects of aging on his body and physical form. When turning 70, Freud took the ultimate step, he painted himself naked. Painter Working, Reflection (1993) shows Freud stripped down to his naked essence. He faces the mirror with palette and palette knife in his hands. This pose suggests defense whereas Freud’s body is vulnerable and weakened by age.

     Currently, the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna (KHM) shows a retrospective of Lucian Freud’s oeuvre. The Freud family maintained a close relationship with this museum. Sigmund Freud was an avid collector of antiquities and friends of his worked as curators at the KHM. Also, Bruegel’s seasonal landscapes—reproductions of which were given to Lucian as a boy—belong to the KHM.

     Vienna and his family ties with Sigmund Freud mattered to Lucian Freud. He had fond memories of his childhood, visiting his grandfather in Berggasse, where Sigmund Freud lived and developed his psychoanalysis. But Vienna was also the place his family had to flee to escape Nazism. The family lost their beloved Austrian Heimat (homeland), their personal property, four of Sigmund Freud’s sisters were deported to Theresienstadt, Auschwitz, and Treblinka.

     The KHM exhibition is the first retrospective of Lucian Freud’s work ever held in Vienna. Freud had assisted in choosing the paintings for this exhibition, he had also planned to visit the museum. Unfortunately, Lucian Freud died on the 21st of July 2011 in London and could no longer see his paintings in Vienna’s Kunsthistorisches Museum hanging side by side with his Netherlandish Old Masters.

Lucian Freud, Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna, 08th October 2013 – 06th January 2014. www.khm.at

Lucian Freud: In Private. Photographs by David Dawson, Sigmund Freud Museum Vienna, 09th October 2013 – 06th January 2014. www.freud-museum.at