Bacon, Francis. (1909 - 1992)
Triptych August 1972 - SIGNED Tate Gallery Invitation
1985 exhibition invitation illustrated with a detail from his painting Triptych August 1972, boldly signed "Francis Bacon" in black ink to the blank margin beneath the image. 3pp. Small 4to. Some very light surface wear to the image, else fine. A melancholy and striking souvenir.The invitation is for the Press View of a 1985 exhibition at the Tate Gallery, held on May 21, 1985. The card's cover illustrates a portrait of George Dyer (1934 - 1971), Bacon's deceased lover, from his Triptych August 1972. A September 2016 Tate Gallery label notes, "This work is generally considered one in a series of Black Triptychs which followed the suicide of Bacon's lover, George Dyer. Dyer appears on the left and Bacon is on the right. The central group is derived from a photograph of wrestlers by Edward Muybridge, but also suggests a more sexual encounter. The seated figures and their coupling are set against black voids and the central flurry has been seen as a 'life-and-death struggle.' The artists's biographer wrote: "What death has not already consumed seeps incontinently out of the figures as their shadows.'" (17302)
Art/Sculpture Art & Design