I'm Kenney Mencher. I'm an artist who left a tenured professorship in 2016 to pursue making art full time. This blog is about art, art history, with a emphasis on human rights. I make homoerotic art featuring bears, otters & other gay wildlife.
Monday
20th C Lucian Freud
Lucian Freud is one of those artists whose name comes up a lot, especially among other painters. His studio assistant wrote a biography about him recently, which is how I learned the correct pronunciation of his name—"looshun.” He’s a figure painter that I really admire, and I often look to his work for inspiration. If I could afford it, I’d love to own one of his paintings. The physical or formal qualities of his work are probably what has made him as important or well known painter as he is today, however it never hurts to come from a famous family. His grandfather was Sigmund Freud. His personality and temperament, formed by his family connections, his history, and his relationships, is evidenced in his art.
I’ve always wondered what makes an artist successful. Throughout history, many artists have had strong connections with wealthy or influential people. During the Renaissance, this was especially true for figures like Michelangelo and Raphael. Their talent played a huge role in their success, but their access to powerful patrons also helped.
Looking at more recent artists from the 18th and 19th centuries, social connections seem just as important. But it’s hard to say whether success comes down to networking, raw ability, or just being in the right place at the right time. Many well-known artists were part of groups or movements—like the Impressionists—which helped them gain recognition. Some, like Van Gogh and Monet, only became widely appreciated later in life or even after their deaths. Meanwhile, artists who were popular in their time, such as Van Gogh’s uncle Anton Mauve or William-Adolphe Bouguereau, are not as widely studied today.
Lucian Freud is an interesting case. It’s easy to focus on his connections—his biography reads like a list of famous names. He knew Francis Bacon and many leading artists of the 1940s and ’50s. Later in life, he associated with David Hockney, spent time with figures like Kate Moss, and painted well-known subjects, including performance artist Leigh Bowery. He was even commissioned to paint a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II. While his social ties gave him opportunities, his technical skill and intense approach to painting played a huge role in his long career.
He was born in
Berlin, Germany, in 1922 but moved to England with his family in 1933 to escape
the rise of the Nazi Party. His grandfather was Sigmund Freud, the Austrian
neurologist who founded psychoanalysis, which meant Lucian grew up in an
intellectually and culturally influential family. This background gave him
certain social advantages, though his early years as a painter were not
particularly lucrative.
Even though Freud wasn’t initially wealthy, his background gave him certain advantages. His grandfather Sigmund Freud, celebrity, insured that he grew up with a bit of privilege. Lucian’s family were highly educated and well-connected in cultural circles—what some people call cultural capital. Freud acknowledged that his name carried weight, and he knew that people saw him in part through the lens of his family history. That connection to psychology also fits with his work in a way—his paintings focus on the human form in a way that can feel deeply psychological, making you wonder if he’s painting what he sees or what he interprets about the person in front of him.
The Freud family was able to help him get an education, afford the materials, and the space he needed to paint. This gave him a level of freedom that not all artists have. He went to well-known art schools, but at the same time, he had connections to rougher parts of London’s social scene. Some of his biographies mention that he had ties to gangsters in the 1940s and ‘50s, and there were even rumors that certain people had to be “persuaded” to follow through on deals involving paying up for his paintings. His studio assistant wrote about how Freud leaned into both his social background and his reputation as a tough guy to help establish himself in the art world.
Lucian Freud’s early years as a painter were shaped not just by his talent but by the people around him. In the 1940s and 1950s, when he was in his twenties, he was deeply involved in London’s bohemian art scene, particularly in Soho. This was a time when artists, writers, and intellectuals gathered in smoky bars, exchanged ideas, and helped each other find opportunities.
One of his closest friends in this period was John Craxton, a fellow artist, and lover, who shared his interest in European modernism. They traveled together, especially in Greece, and explored new styles of painting. Then there was Francis Bacon—perhaps Freud’s most important artistic connection. The two spent countless nights in Soho’s Colony Room Club, drinking and debating art. Bacon’s work, known for its raw energy, had a strong influence on Freud, though Freud eventually developed his own more controlled style.
Freud also moved in literary circles. Cyril Connolly, the editor of Horizon magazine, published Freud’s work in the 1940s, giving him exposure among intellectuals. Poet Stephen Spender helped introduce Freud to well-connected patrons, while Sonia Orwell, the widow of George Orwell, brought him into literary gatherings. Another key figure was Peter Watson, a wealthy art patron who financially supported many young British painters, including Freud.
In the 1950s, Freud’s personal life further expanded his social network. He married Lady Caroline Blackwood, an heiress and writer, which connected him to the British aristocracy. Though their marriage didn’t last, it placed Freud in circles that helped secure his early commissions and exhibitions.
Soho’s bohemian world played a crucial role in Freud’s rise as an artist. His friendships and social ties gave him the kind of support and opportunities that many young painters struggled to find. His talent was undeniable, but his early success was also built on the people who helped open doors for him, but his connection to the British glitterati started even earlier than this.
In his childhood, his privilege connected him to important teachers and mentors. Lucian didn’t stick to one art school for long. He started at the Central School of Art in London and later at the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing, which was run by the artist Cedric Morris and this was at least instrumental in introducing him to the fundamentals.
His first art school mentor Cedric Morris was a big deal in the British art scene, not just as a painter but also as a teacher, and he encouraged Freud to develop his own style rather than just copying what was fashionable. Although Freud and Morris’s styles were different, Freud picked up some habits and methodologies from his instructor. If you compare Freud’s portraits from the 1980’s, there are similarities in texture, color, and proportion. To Freud’s later works.
Lucian Freud talked about his time studying under Cedric Morris in interviews, describing Morris’s way of painting as almost mechanical—like a printer, applying color in horizontal bands from the top of the canvas down. Almost like a window shade being pulled down. This approach was different from how most painters work, since many start with rough outlines or block in large shapes before adding details. Morris’s method was more systematic, building up the image in a structured way. His floral and landscape paintings show this careful approach, though his work wasn’t always precise in terms of proportions or perspective.
Freud’s paintings share similarities with Morris’s in that both artists focused on close observation rather than following academic rules of naturalism or illusionism, that emphasize accurate anatomical proportions and the use of linear perspective to create space and depth. In Morris’s painting September Diagram, the table and surrounding architecture are made up of tilted planes that don’t follow strict rules of perspective. Some of the shapes, especially the ellipses, have an inexact quality like the work of Paul Cézanne, appearing intuitive rather than mathematically precise. While there is some shading and cast shadow, the painting does not follow the academic techniques of chiaroscuro, such as reflected light, that are traditionally used to create a sense of volume. However, Freud’s work, at least at first, was more carefully rendered and has a kind of Northern Renaissance or Late Gothic feeling to it.
Something that characterizes all of Freud’s work is that it is very analytical, based in a close observation, but not necessarily naturalistic or photo realist in style. Freud started his career painting in a precise, almost graphic style. Freud’s paintings are filled with closely observed details like Van Eyck’s Arnolfini Wedding Portrait, but like Van Eyck, they are distorted and a bit disproportionate. Morris, Freud, and Van Eyck don’t choose to unify the illusion of space and depth with linear perspective. I’m fairly certain that all three artists would have been taught traditional linear perspective but chose to discard it probably for esthetic and especially symbolic reasons. All three use intuitive perspective rather than linear perspective. Each artist “guesstimates” the orthogonal lines and vanishing points. A good example is, Lucian Freud’s, Interior in Paddington, 1951. It is very similar to Van Eyck’s Arnolfini portrait.
Freud’s Interior in Paddington, has a lot in common with Jan van Eyck’s Arnolfini Portrait, particularly in the way both artists handle detail, space, and texture. Both artists, like a lot of detail, especially in rendering faces, hands, and clothing. But the proportions are a bit off in each. They both look a bit surreal. There’s a stiffness to the pose, and the figure appears deliberately still, almost staged. There is carefully observed shading and rendering of textures, objects, and light, while ignoring traditional formulas that govern the proportions of things like the figures’ anatomy and space.
The anatomy is mostly accurate but has a slightly distorted quality. The figures posture is upright, formal, and slightly rigid, much like the figures in van Eyck’s portrait. Neither Freud or van Eyck used the popular classical counter posture the contrapposto stance. In each, the figures stand in a pose reminiscent of Byzantine art, the drapery is carefully observed and rendered, but again, not in a particularly Classic or Renaissance manner.
Both paintings balance realism with symbolic choices. Van Eyck includes small details—like the mirror in the background, the oranges, and the intricate textures of fabric—to suggest meaning beyond simple portraiture. Freud, while not as concerned with traditional symbolism, uses detail in a similar way, making every surface and object feel observed and tangible. In both works, realism is pushed just far enough to make the figures feel present, but certain exaggerations or stylizations keep them from being purely naturalistic.
Lucian Freud’s Interior in Paddington (1951) is more than just a portrait—it is a study of psychological tension and unease. Harry Diamond, a photographer, and a friend of Freud. He stands awkwardly in a dimly lit room, wearing an oversized coat, holding a cigarette in one hand while clenching the other into a fist. His expression is serious, almost tense, and his large glasses make him look both intellectual and a little vulnerable.
The painting takes place inside Lucian Freud’s home in Paddington, London, with a view of the neighborhood visible through the window. Harry Diamond, wearing glasses, holds a cigarette in his left hand, though it’s his right hand that appears deeply stained with nicotine. His right hand is clenched into a fist, and he seems to be staring intensely at a spiky houseplant, likely a type of yucca. His tense posture gives the impression that he might be about to strike the plant. This could be a playful reference to Diamond’s well-known sharp personality.
Diamond is dressed in a wrinkled, unbuttoned Gannex mac, a type of raincoat that was a regular part of his wardrobe. Freud later painted him wearing the same coat in another portrait from the late 1950s. Paddington Interior (1951) was Freud’s first major commissioned work, created for the Arts Council’s exhibition Sixty Paintings for ’51, part of the Festival of Britain. The painting won a prize and marked an important moment in Freud’s early career. However, Diamond wasn’t pleased with how he was portrayed—he felt Freud had made his legs look too short.
It's possible to overinterpret Freud’s painting. (The same is true with van Eyck’s.) For example is including the plant a deliberate choice? It looks dry, spiky, and almost lifeless, which makes it feel like a reflection of Diamond’s own discomfort. It also adds to the overall feeling of tension and neglect in the painting. Then there's the window in the background, which shows part of the city outside. It might seem like an open space, but the balcony railing almost makes it feel like a barrier, hinting at a sense of being trapped indoors.
The red carpet under his feet is another interesting detail. It’s bold and dramatic, contrasting with the duller tones of the room. It could symbolize emotions bubbling beneath the surface—maybe frustration, unease, or even passion. The way it’s cut off by the floorboards adds to the sense that something is off or unbalanced.
Harry Diamond, the subject in Lucian Freud’s Interior in Paddington, wasn’t just some random model—he was a well-known London photographer who spent time with artists like Freud and Francis Bacon. He was usually the one taking pictures, not the one being captured, which might explain why he looks so tense in the painting.
Freud and Diamond were friends, but their relationship wasn’t always easy. Freud was famous for making his models sit (or stand) for long, grueling sessions, which many people found frustrating. Diamond, who had a strong personality, didn’t love the experience, and that might be why he looks so stiff and uncomfortable. His clenched fist, awkward posture, and direct stare all suggest he wasn’t totally at ease.
Knowing this, the painting starts to feel even more intense. Freud wasn’t just painting what Diamond looked like—he was capturing the tension between them. The result is a portrait that feels psychological, almost like a glimpse into a quiet, real-life struggle between artist and subject. If he portrayed his friend in this way, imagine how his lovers felt.
20th C Les Fauves
Sometimes paintings have a life of their own and the story of who and how they were commissioned, and where they traveled adds something to a student’s understanding of why we study them. Sometimes we imagine that a painting was instantly famous and placed as part of the art historical canon, and this may be true, but paintings often become famous because of who owned and who exhibits them today.
Henri Matisse painted Harmony in Red (also called La Desserte) in 1908 in Paris. His shows with the Fauves a few years earlier put him on the map with important collectors who could make an artist’s career. This painting was originally commissioned by a Russian art collector named Sergei Shchukin, who had been buying modern French art and was one of Matisse’s main supporters. Shchukin had a large collection of Matisse’s paintings in his home in Moscow and even turned some of the rooms into small private galleries.
After the Russian Revolution in 1917, Shchukin’s collection was taken by the Soviet state. His house and all the artwork in it were turned into a public museum. Harmony in Red became part of that state-owned collection. Today, it’s in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia. It was moved there along with other works from Shchukin’s collection when the Soviet government restructured how art was stored and displayed.
The painting’s monumental reputation is somewhat matched to its physical size. It is around 180 by 200 centimeters, which is about 6 feet by 6.5 feet. Like the Green Stripe, it is a painting of an everyday scene, although this is less of a portrait, however, the real subject matter is a combination of color and this time pattern.
When Matisse first painted the scene, he called it Harmony in Blue, but he changed the whole background to red after it was done. It’s unclear why he changed it, but the version we know today is the red one. The painting shows a room with a woman setting a table. There’s a window or possibly a painting within the painting, and the entire surface is covered in a pattern that blends the wall and the table.
I have my own theory about this. It’s possible that Harmony in Red by Henri Matisse is connected in some way to changes in fabric design and interior decoration that came with industrialization. By 1908, when Matisse painted it, mass production had already made patterned textiles more common and affordable. Factories could print designs on cloth quickly, and more people were using these fabrics in their homes—for tablecloths, curtains, and wallpaper.
Earlier artists like some of the Impressionists painted these new interior spaces, showing how patterns and decorations were becoming part of everyday life. This was also a time when leaders like Queen Victoria were encouraging people to use more “tasteful” patterns in their homes. At world’s fairs, like the ones where Joseph Paxton’s glass building was shown, countries displayed new industrial products, including fabric and furniture, and tried to set style trends.
In Harmony in Red, Matisse fills almost the entire surface with one pattern that covers both the wall and the table. The shapes are decorative, like something you’d see on printed fabric. He flattens the space and uses the same pattern across different surfaces, which blurs the line between furniture and background. This kind of treatment might reflect how printed designs had become part of everyday visual life, especially in the home.
While there’s no clear proof that Matisse was directly thinking about industrial textile production, he was living in a time when patterns, color, and decoration were all changing because of it. Painters were seeing these changes and responding in different ways. Harmony in Red could be one way Matisse showed that shift—not by copying a factory product, but by using similar decorative ideas in a painting.
Some art historians have looked at the updated color in Harmony in Red—originally planned as Harmony in Blue—and suggested that Matisse changed it to red to create a stronger sense of unity and visual impact across the whole surface. The red background makes the patterns and objects blend together instead of standing apart. This shift away from naturalistic space toward something more decorative and flat was unusual at the time and showed how Matisse was thinking differently about what a painting could do.
The color doesn’t follow traditional rules of light or shading. Instead, it covers nearly the entire canvas in a flat, even red, with dark blue curving lines for the pattern. This makes the room seem less like a realistic space and more like a flat surface filled with decoration. Some art historians think Matisse was influenced by things like Islamic tilework, Japanese prints, or other non-Western art forms where flatness and pattern were important. These kinds of images were becoming more available in Europe in the late 1800s and early 1900s because of global trade and colonial expansion.
The interaction between the red color and the repeated pattern has also been described as a way of making the viewer more aware of the painting as a surface, rather than a window into a 3D space. This idea was different from most European painting up to that point, which usually tried to create depth and realism.
Art historians often consider Harmony in Red a groundbreaking work because it challenges those older traditions. It puts color and design at the center, not story or illusion. It also helped lay the groundwork for later art movements like Abstract Expressionism and Color Field painting, which took these ideas even further. Matisse’s painting showed that you could use bold color and decoration in a serious, large-scale artwork—not just in crafts or design.
The Horse, the Rider, and the Clown and Icarus were both made by Henri Matisse in 1947 as part of a project called Jazz. This series included 20 color prints and was published by the art dealer Tériade (whose real name was Stratis Eleftheriades). He was a major figure in publishing limited-edition art books in mid-20th century France. Tériade asked Matisse to create the series, and it was printed in Paris by Éditions Verve.
Matisse made Jazz after he had gone through major surgery in 1941 for abdominal cancer. After that, he used a wheelchair and couldn't paint the way he used to. Instead, he began working with paper cut-outs, a method he called gouaches découpées—which means painted paper cut and arranged into shapes. These works were then turned into prints using a process called pochoir, which is a hand-stenciling technique where each color is applied separately using stencils. It allowed for bright, solid colors, and each print was done with great care by craftspeople who specialized in that process.
The original Jazz portfolio was printed in an edition of 250 copies. Each book included handwritten-style text by Matisse alongside the prints. He had planned to write stories or commentary to go with each image, but instead, the text became more like loose notes about art and life. The series includes figures from circus, mythology, and theater, which were all subjects Matisse had explored earlier in his career.
This project was made during and just after World War II, when France was recovering from the war. The printing was delayed because of shortages of materials and the general disruption caused by the war. Even though Matisse was in poor health, he worked closely with assistants to arrange the cut-outs, and he supervised the printing process. His studio was in the south of France at this time, far from Paris, and he worked in a quiet, private setting.
Today, complete Jazz portfolios and individual plates like The Horse, the Rider, and the Clown and Icarus are held in many major museums, including the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and the Art Institute of Chicago. Their exact locations can vary depending on exhibitions and loans, but they’re considered part of many permanent collections.
In The Horse, the Rider, and the Clown and Icarus, from Henri Matisse’s Jazz series (1947), the figures and shapes don’t show a full story the way a painting from the Renaissance might, but they still use symbols that connect to older traditions—especially from mythology, performance, and storytelling.
In Icarus, Matisse shows a figure falling or floating with arms outstretched. The title connects it to the Greek myth of Icarus, the boy who flew too close to the sun with wings made of feathers and wax. The wax melted, and he fell into the sea. It’s a myth that shows up a lot in European art and literature. The red shape near the figure’s chest has been described by some art historians as a symbolic heart or a wound, linking to the moment of Icarus’s fall. Other scholars see the red shape as just part of the design, not meant to look like a real heart or injury.
In The Horse, the Rider, and the Clown, the images come from the circus. Matisse was interested in performance and had seen circuses during his life. Horses and clowns were common subjects in French popular entertainment, especially in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The clown here may relate to the Pierrot figure from commedia dell’arte, an old style of theater that used costumes and set roles. The rider could be a reference to circus performers or equestrian shows. These were familiar in France, where street performers and traveling circuses were popular forms of entertainment. The symbols here don’t seem to form one full scene or narrative. They are more like parts from different acts, side by side on the same stage.
The cut-out style of the Jazz series adds to how the symbols are arranged. The shapes are bold and flat, almost like paper dolls or silhouettes. They aren’t placed in a deep space with backgrounds or settings. Instead, they float, with strong outlines and no shadows. This makes the symbols feel separated, but still part of the same visual rhythm. Some art historians think this organization relates to jazz music, where individual instruments play alone and also as a group. Matisse himself chose the title Jazz, and while the pictures don’t show musical scenes, the way the shapes move and interact might be a kind of visual version of rhythm and syncopation.
Different art historians have offered different takes on the meaning. Some link Icarus to ideas of war or human failure, since it was made just after World War II. Others say it’s about freedom or the risk that comes with creativity. In The Horse, the Rider, and the Clown, some scholars see a mix of joy and danger—the fun of the circus alongside the risk of falling, jumping, or getting hurt. But Matisse didn’t write detailed explanations of what each picture meant, so interpretations vary.
Overall, the symbols in Jazz don’t form one fixed message. They draw on older stories, performances, and visual traditions, but they are arranged in a new way. The images were created during a time when Matisse was working through illness and recovery, and the world was coming out of war. The use of circus and myth might reflect those conditions—both serious and playful, old and new, personal and public. The symbols are organized more by rhythm and color than by a set storyline, and that approach was unusual in art at the time.
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