Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion

The triptych summarises themes explored in Bacon's previous work, including his examination of Picasso's biomorphs and his interpretations of the Crucifixion and the Greek Furies.

[2] The Three Studies are generally considered Bacon's first mature piece;[3] he regarded his works before the triptych as irrelevant, and throughout his life tried to suppress their appearance on the art market.

[6] These abstract figurations contain formal elements typical of their time, including diaphanous forms, flat backgrounds,[7] and surrealist props such as flowers and umbrellas.

The art critic Wieland Schmied noted that while the early works are "aesthetically pleasing", they lack "a sense of urgency or inner necessity; they are beautiful, but lifeless".

[9] When he returned to the topic of the Crucifixion eleven years later, he retained some of the stylistic elements he had developed earlier, such as the elongated and dislocated organic forms that he now based on Oresteia.

The early publications of John Russell and David Sylvester open with the 1944 triptych, and Bacon insisted to his death that no retrospective should feature paintings pre-dating 1944.

[13] The panels of Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion are painted on light Sundeala boards, a material Bacon was using at the time as an inexpensive alternative to canvas.

The orange hue displays inconsistently across the canvasses, due in part to the low level of oil in the paint, which resulted in varying rates of absorption into the board.

Situated on an isolated patch of grass, the right-hand figure's toothed mouth is stretched open as if screaming, although David Sylvester has suggested that it may be yawning.

[17] The orange background of this panel is brighter than the hues rendered in the other frames,[7] and the figure's neck opens up into a row of teeth, while a protruding ear juts out from behind its lower jaw.

The area below the head is thickly coated with white and orange paint, while the inspection exposes a series of underlying curved brushstrokes used to compose a landscape, and a small distant reclining figure.

[23][24] The triptych format, the placement of figures behind glass in heavily gilded frames, the open mouth, the use of painterly distortion, the Furies, and the theme of the Crucifixion were all to reappear in later works.

"[31] Aeschylus' phrase "the reek of human blood smiles out at me" in particular haunted Bacon, and his treatments of the mouth in the triptych and many subsequent paintings were attempts to visualise the sentiment.

In Eliot's play, the Furies serve as embodiments of the remorse and guilt felt by Harry, who harbours a dark family secret, shared only with his sister.

[35] In 1942, he read the Irish scholar William Bedell Stanford's Aeschylus in his Style, and found the theme of obsessive guilt in The Oresteia to be highly resonant.

[37] The mouth of the triptych's central figure was also inspired by the nurse's scream in film director Sergei Eisenstein's Odessa Steps massacre sequence in The Battleship Potemkin (1925).

[38] In 1984, the broadcaster Melvyn Bragg confronted Bacon with a reproduction of the centre panel during the filming of a South Bank Show documentary, and observed that in his earlier career the artist seemed preoccupied with the physicality of the human mouth.

[39] Bacon often expressed his admiration for the manner in which old masters such as Cimabue treated the Crucifixion; however, as with Picasso, he was more interested in tackling the subject from a secular, humanist point of view.

Art critic Ziva Amishai-Maisseles observes that the canvas reflects Bacon's own confusion and ambivalence "towards manifestations of violence and power, both of which attracted and repulsed him simultaneously.

"[7] Three Studies was first shown at a joint exhibition at the Lefevre Gallery, London, in April 1945, alongside work by Henry Moore and Graham Sutherland.

"[47] Writing for Apollo magazine, Herbert Furst recalled, "I, I must confess, was so shocked and disturbed by the Surrealism of Francis Bacon that I was glad to escape from this exhibition.

[50] Reviewing for the New Statesman and Nation, Raymond Mortimer wrote that the panels "seems served from Picasso's Crucifixion [1930], but further distorted, with ostrich necks and button heads protruding from bags—the whole effect gloomily phallic, like Bosch without the humour.

I have no doubt of Mr. Bacon's uncommon gifts, but these pictures expressing his sense of the atrocious world into which we have survived seems [to me] symbols of outrage rather than works of art.

[52] Matthew Kieran wrote, in his 2005 essay on the painting, that "these frightened, blind, raging figures are visceral in their impact, jolting one into sensations of fright, horror, isolation and angst.

[54] Denis Farr suggested that while the second version's larger scale gave it "a majestic quality which is highly effective", its svelte presentation lessened its shock value.

Nonetheless the 1988 version (or near copy) of the great 1944 Crucifixion Triptych is the lesser work: it is slicker, more polished and it evinces a greater ease with paint.