The Art Institute of Chicago

Sunny Morning: Eight LegsAuthor(s): Stephanie D'AlessandroSource: Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies, Vol. 29, No. 2, Notable Quotations at TheArt Institute of Chicago (2003), pp. 88-89Published by: The Art Institute of ChicagoStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4121072 .

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Sunny Morning-Eight Legs

1997

Lucian Freud

(English, born Germany, 1922)

Oil on canvas; 234 x 132.1 cm (92 1/8 x 52 in.)

JOSEPH WINTERBOTHAM COLLECTION, 1997.5 6

F or over fifty years, Lucian Freud has subjected the human form to intense and uncompromising scruti-

ny, whether in portraits, or, more frequently, in studies of male and female nudes. He executed his early works in a

precise, extraordinarily detailed manner that was reminis- cent of both Northern Renaissance as well as 1920os New

Objectivity paintings. By the late 195os, however, Freud abandoned his meticulous approach, handling paint in a

progressively broader way and building up a thicker sur- face. The artist did not use these techniques to reflect an Abstract Expressionist painting style or to produce an emotional effect, but rather as a way to make paint a more

physical, palpable surrogate for flesh.

Sunny Morning-Eight Legs is one of Freud's most monumental and impressive paintings. To execute it, the artist swept his hog-hair brush vigorously across the sur- face of the canvas, building form out of thick layers of

pigment much as a sculptor works clay. The rigor of this

technique is matched by that of the composition, which

challenges the viewer with a confusion of limbs and

perspectives. With head thrown back, eyes open, upper torso twisted, and bent legs stretched awkwardly, the foreshortened figure seems a study in tension-and even discomfort-in contrast to the easy state of the dog that rests beside him. From beneath the bed emerges a pair of

legs that echo but reverse those of the reclining man; in

choosing to include them, Freud introduced an element of narrative complexity and mystery rarely found in his work. The man's nakedness, his pained expression, and the precipitous angle of the studio floor-together with an unforgiving, yellow light that suffuses the entire paint- ing-produce an extremely powerful image of vulnerabil-

ity and restlessness.

STEPHANIE D'ALESSANDRO

88

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