Confronted with these introspective, unsettling, and at times repulsive portraits, one might ask: What makes them special?

The answer lies in the uncompromising vision of their author, British portraitist Lucian Freud, one of the most influential figures in XX century art. A grandson of Sigmund Freud, he channelled the psychoanalytic ideas into paint, striving to uncover what lies beneath the surface of physical appearance.

Whether portraying anonymous sitters or iconic figures like Kate Moss, he refused to idealise. The human body, to him, was not an object of beauty, but a living, aging, flawed, and truthful presence.

His close friendship with another art legend, Francis Bacon, further sharpened this vision. Freud admired Bacon’s emotive distortion and raw immediacy; Bacon, in turn, drew inspiration from Freud’s psychological insight. Together, they redefined the possibilities of figurative art in an era increasingly dominated by abstraction.

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