YOUNG BRITISH ARTISTS OF TWO ERA'SFRANCIS BACON & DAMIEN HIRST

YOUNG BRITISH ARTISTS OF TWO ERA'S
FRANCIS BACON & DAMIEN HIRST


The themes of time, decay and flesh, coupled with death and destruction are subjects, which seem to hold a particular fascination for two artists of the twentieth century; Francis Bacon and Damien Hirst. There are some examples of artists in earlier periods dealing with these subjects
such as Boticelli and his depictions of Dante’s hell theme, but these are isolated examples. In general it seems that popular artists through the ages have preferred to deal with more glamorous subjects either through choice, or because of simple commercial pressures. There may well have been artists producing work for a specialist non-popular market, verging on the pornographic but these have not stood the test of time. Even during the depressing, gloomy introverted periods of the Victorian era art seems to have been formal and moralistic rather than morbid.

Bacon seems to dwell on, or at least be pre-occupied by, war, meat ...