Art Review: ‘Francis Bacon: Late Paintings’ Captivates in Houston

The Houston Museum of Fine Arts’ new blockbuster is Francis Bacon: Late Paintings, which opened at the end of February. Organized by the MFA and the Pompidou Center in Paris, it looks at Bacon, an icon and an enigma, from the early 1970s to his death in 1992. Bacon was a nervy, sulfuric, irascible artist. Did his core traits intensify as he aged, dissolving features that once smoothed the rough edges? That’s what happens to most old people. Or did this angry, turbulent atheist mellow?

The exhibition is a grand one, and it looks perfect in the MFA’s Mies van der Rohe galleries. Not a bucket but a pint of curatorial detachment dampens Bacon’s fire, though. The show doesn’t run away from anything but broaches where I’d attack and knead and pound. Was it the interpretation or the art itself that left me cooler under the collar than I expected?

About the Author

Brian T. Allen

Brian T. Allen is National Review’s art critic.

The Houston Museum of Fine Arts’ new blockbuster is Francis Bacon: Late Paintings, which opened at the end of February. Organized by the MFA and the Pompidou Center in Paris, it looks at Bacon, an icon and an enigma, from the early 1970s to his death in 1992. Bacon was a nervy, sulfuric, irascible artist. Did his core traits intensify as he aged, dissolving features that once smoothed the rough edges? That’s what happens to most old people. Or did this angry, turbulent atheist mellow?

The exhibition is a grand one, and it looks perfect in the MFA’s Mies van der Rohe galleries. Not a bucket but a pint of curatorial detachment dampens Bacon’s fire, though. The show doesn’t run away from anything but broaches where I’d attack and knead and pound. Was it the interpretation or the art itself that left me cooler under the collar than I expected?