Lucian Freud

Lucian Freud

(b. 1922 Berlin, Germany – immigrated to Great Britain 1933 – d. 2011 London, England)

Lord Goodman in His Yellow Pyjamas, 1987 Etching with hand-colouring in yellow watercolour on Rives BFK paper Signed with initials and numbered ‘A.P. VIII/X’ in pencil Private Collection

Freud’s etchings form a unique and distinct body of work within his oeuvre. Baron Arnold Goodman (1915–1995) was a lawyer and political advisor and Freud’s ‘fixer’. The pyjamas suggest an easy intimacy between the artist and his sitter. After completing the etching, Freud coloured them with a yellow wash in each of the 50 impressions. Grandson of Sigmund Freud, Lucian was born into a Jewish family, with whom he escaped to England in 1933. He studied at the Central School of Art, London, Cedric Morris’ East Anglian School, and Goldsmith’s College prior to enlisting in the Merchant Navy during the Second World War. He is celebrated for his psychologically penetrating, realistic portraiture, usually of members of his close circle and family.

Lucian Freud

(b. 1922 Berlin, Germany – immigrated to Great Britain 1933 – d. 2011 London, England)

Before the Fourth, 2004 Etching on Somerset textured paper Sheet 57.3 x 66.0 cm Plate 34.5 x 42.9 cm Artist’s Proof 1/12 Private Collection

Before the Fourth portrays the society figure and actress Annabel Mullion, pregnant with her fourth child, William Ajax Baring; the composition echoes Gauguin’s Nevermore. Freud had painted Mullion previously with her dog Rattler in 1998, and a year after this etching made the related painting Expecting the Fourth.