Lucian Freud’s Queen Elizabeth II, Part 1
Unlike major artists before him Lucian Freud was not commissioned to paint the portrait of his monarch, Queen Elizabeth II. He had to ask. Nevertheless the Queen agreed and over a 19-month period in 2000 and 2001 Britain's monarch sat for Britain's painter. I give him that title because, if there were such a position as painter laureate, it would be Freud's. The end-result of their many sessions was, from the Queen's point-of-view, not a happy one. The portrait which he gave her was both small and remarkably unflattering, many suggesting at the time that it looked nothing like the Queen. Britain's press went wild.
What Freud did, of course, as regular users of this site will recognize, was paint the Queen as an alter ego of himself, giving her the shape of his eyebrows, his small eyes, the heavy creases in his own face and, most oddly, his brick-like chin. Painted, of course, in his signature style, the Queen is Freud. Other great masters, from Fouquet in the fifteenth century onwards, have done likewise.
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Left: Freud, Detail of Queen Elizabeth II (2000-01)
Right: Freud, Detail of Self-Portrait, Self-Reflection (2002)
Click image to enlarge.
Although the self-portrait used here for comparison was painted a year later, there are others that include similar features. The reason I use it, though, is to demonstrate that "face fusion" and its associated methods works both ways. Freud has given his own hair the shape of the Queen's jeweled crown and, perhaps, some of her features too. Look at the shapes indicated in the diagram and compare.
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Left: Detail of Queen Elizabeth II (2000-01)
Right: Diagram of detail of Self-Portrait, Self-Reflection (2002)
Click image to enlarge.
Freud, in following tradition, presents himself as a monarch in his own mind, a ruler in the world of art whom later masters will follow as his subjects. To make that implication, he portrays his mind as regal and androgynous in both portraits: as the Queen in one, with the Queen's crown in his hair in the other. Despite face fusion, though, each individual retains their own distinct look. We recognize each of them. Nevertheless, like many great masters before him, Freud "paints himself" in every painting and every portrait. You just have to know how to look.
Left: Freud, Detail of Queen Elizabeth II (2000-01)
Right: Freud, Detail of Self-Portrait, Self-Reflection (2002)
Click image to enlarge.
Publication Date: 22 Jul 2011
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