| Mystery auction buyer brings home
the Bacon A RECORD £14million was paid last week in London
for a Francis Bacon painting.
The oil-on-canvas painting of A Pope, Study For Portrait II, was sold
at Christie’s, London and topped the previous price of over £7.3million
paid for another Bacon work in New York late last year.
No details have emerged of the purchaser and a spokesperson for Christie’s
said they would not be disclosing the identity of the new owner or where
it would now be located.
The Dublin-born artist died in Madrid in 1992 at the age of 81 and very
few of his works now remain in private collections.
The head of post-war and contemporary art at Christie’s, Pilar Ordovas,
said that Study For Portrait II was the most important work from Bacon’s
Pope series to appear on the market.
The canvas which measures 152.5 x 116cm is presumed to be the second of
two paintings of Popes which Bacon painted in the autumn of 1956.
The first one hangs in the National Gallery of Canada.
When it emerged that the painting was being offered for sale the director
of the Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin, Barbara Dawson, said that she would
love to add the picture to the Bacon collection at the gallery but its
estimated price tag was too expensive.
The gallery already owns seven Bacon oils and 7,500 individual pieces
from Bacon’s Reece Mews Studio.
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