Retranslation | final unfinished portrait (Francis Bacon) | figure inscribing a figure | [take 02]  

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The exhibition 'Corps étrangers' at the Musée du Louvre explores a dialogue between dance and drawing. In the galleries dedicated to antique statuary, William Forsythe and Peter Welz examine the human figure and its relation to space with an installation that mixes painting, drawing and video projections. Inspired by Francis Bacon's final unfinished self-portrait, a masterpiece that is being shown for the first time in France, the installation ‚retranslation | final unfinished portrait (Francis Bacon) | figure inscribing figure' has been linked with the experience of an ontological loss.

The installation is indebted to Samuel Beckett as much as to Francis Bacon, as Forsythe says when he speaks of "registering and inscribing the presence of an absence“ while the camera captures Forsythe from a variety of perspectives - frontal, above and from the side as in understanding a sculpture in space.

In the Mollien rooms, a selection of graphic works from the Louvre and Musée d'Orsay collections resonates with film works by Sonia Andrade, Samuel Beckett, Bruce Nauman and Kazuo Ohno, performances in which body language interferes with those of the image, disturbing the systems of the figuration.

final unfinished portrait
(Francis Bacon | Self-Portrait, 1991–92)
Oil on canvas, 198,2 cm x 146,7 cm

© The Estate of Francis Bacon. All rights reserved. DACS 2017. Image courtesy of Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane.

‘‘Bacon’s final painting, an unfinished portrait, was on the easel when he died. The central figure, a profile, is sufficiently detailed to recognise it as being George Dyer although there is also a resemblance to the artist. The other figures in the group are not identifiable. Although they don’t appear that often in his oeuvre Bacon did paint some group portraits, and this circular composition may relate to an earlier work ‘Three Figures and a Portrait’ 1975.’’

Installation view Musée du Louvre
Courtesy Goetz Collection | Photo: © Musée du Louvre / Angèle Dequier,
final unfinished portrait (Francis Bacon, Self-Portrait, 1991–92)
© Peter Welz, © The Estate of Francis Bacon. All rights reserved. DACS 2017. Image courtesy of Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane.

Studies | W. Forsythe re-translating the unfinished portrait by Francis Bacon
final unfinished portrait (Francis Bacon, Self-Portrait, 1991–92)
© Peter Welz, © The Estate of Francis Bacon. All rights reserved. DACS 2017. Image courtesy of Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane | Courtesy Goetz Collection














Study | reconstruction of a cage from a F. Bacon painting | 
portrait of Lucian Freud
Wood, enamel paint
Dimensions variable, studio shot Berlin 2003




Study | reconstruction of a cage from a F. Bacon painting |
triple repetition | portrait of Lucian Freud
Wood, enamel paint
Dimensions variable, studio shot Berlin 2003 | 2020