The more research I did on Francis Bacon, the more enthralled I became. Always on the lookout for troubled musicians whose drunken rhymes I could live by, I’d never been that passionate about any visual artist. But I have to admit – that guy was just like a rock star. Putting one of the most unnerving projections of suffering and alienation on an exhibition just two months after the end of the Second World War stood in major contradiction with any attempts of promoting optimism or tranquil nostalgia in the British society of that period. It also marked the beginning of his mature artwork, which featured references to T.S. Eliot’s poems, reenacting the circumstances of a former lover’s suicide, and general distortion of every human feature you could think of.
Clearly, I thought, with this kind of artistic sensibility, he must have been to Berlin.
And I was right. What’s interesting, though, and why I decided to write this article, is that Bacon’s Berlin experience was not limited to the times he might have been to our beloved Hauptstadt already as an acclaimed painter. First time his wild imagination was undeniably stimulated by this promiscuous city took place in 1927, back in the days of the Weimar Republic, just seven years after the Greater Berlin Act, which we should be forever thankful for, as it let Berlin incorporate some new territories, and among them a town called Neukölln. Hadn’t that happened, we’d be denied those abundances of Döners nowadays and some of the most beautiful tattoos ever done there.
Even at that time, Berlin couldn’t have been mistaken for any other city. The advancements in science (Humboldt University becoming a major intellectual centre), culture (German Expressionism) and design (Bauhaus) appeared parallel to other phenomenons of the society, and describing them as decadent would be quite merciful. Prostitution spread among women and youths of both sexes, the notorious party supply by the name of cocaine was easy to access, and the public got captivated by lust murders (the Black Dahlia kind of story, though this one didn’t happen until 1947) reports.
No wonder then that it is in Berlin that young Francis Bacon might have seen a 1925 silent film which was banned in the UK, France, and later West Germany. Depicting the outcome of a ship crew rebellion, it left an everlasting impression on Bacon. He himself referred to it, and notably the scene which shows a screaming nurse with broken glasses and a bloody wound for an eye, as a catalyst for all his work. If anything is still missing from this almost cliche story of the mystical way Berlin can influence artists, bear in mind that young homosexual Bacon was actually sent here to… become straight.
Bacon’s father arranged the trip hoping that sending his son away on a little excursion with a certain family friend by the name of Harcourt-Smith, whom he regarded as being ultra-masculine, would put an end to any homosexual follies on the offspring’s side. And regardless of how this plan would have never worked in the first place, the circumstances not only proved it useless, but also decided the outcome would be the dreaded opposite of what Bacon’s dad was counting on.
Leaving the actual sexual tendencies of the allegedly masculine Harcourt-Smith aside, Berlin at the time was not the place to oppress anyone’s sexuality. It was home to a pioneer research centre, the Institut fur Sexualwissenschaft. The nightlife was thriving, and especially so, just like today, in clubs like Eldorado, frequented by the homosexual community. No wonder then that after two months spent in Berlin Bacon’s identity remained richer, but unchanged at its core. From here he headed for Paris, where he’d visit exhibitions vital for his initial decision to begin painting…
Text: Michalina Gorajek, Collages: Frank R. Schröder