Portraits, Figures

Portraiture was a mode in which de Francia could give free rein to an innate desire to get across the humanness of his sitters. His subjects include leading lights of the British left – the historian Eric Hobsbawm; the scientist JD Bernal; the composer Alexander Goehr – and of international figures such as the Italian poet Salvatore Quasimodo. But it is typical of de Francia that the emotional intensity of these portraits is equalled by his portraits of otherwise unknown figures – such as the farmers Monsieur and Madame Beylac, who owned a small farm in southern France and whom de Francia called ‘the last vestiges of a totally vanished society’. Much like those of his near contemporary Alice Neel, de Francia’s portraits are distinguished by psychological acumen, social engagement and expressive mastery of line and colour. These qualities are also at play in his anonymous figure compositions – of women washing their feet; boys sipping cups of tea; couples riding bikes and Vespas; families lighting lamps for the evening, or simply lounging around. A world away from the combative, large-scale depictions of modern history for which he is best known, de Francia’s more intimate and withdrawn figure paintings are none the less political. Like Shakespeare’s Hamlet, de Francia understood that ‘the interim is mine’, finding something approaching the truth of life in moments of quiet, unassuming activity.