VIENNA.- From 9 October 2013 through 6 January 2014, the Sigmund Freud Museum, in cooperation with the Kunsthistorisches Museum, is showing photographs taken by David Dawson in the studio of Lucian Freud. The images document the surroundings in which Lucian Freud created his work, providing insight into his working methods and treating visitors to an intimate encounter with one of the most important artists of the twentieth century, who was also the grandson of Sigmund Freud.

Today Lucian Freud numbers among the most widely recognized painters of the 20th century, and his work is exhibited around the world. For the first time in Austria, the
Kunsthistorisches Museum is mounting an exhibition featuring a selection of the artist’s key works. In conjunction with this show, the Sigmund Freud Museum is showing photographs by David Dawson, his assistant over the course of many years. At many points the photographs on view at the Sigmund Freud Museum correspond with the works presented at the KHM. The photo show centers on images capturing Lucian Freud at work, in private situations and in confrontation with his own canvases in public settings.

The photo exhibition “Lucian Freud: In Private: Photographies by David Dawson” thematizes aspects of intimacy and inwardness in the workspace. More specifically, the photographs show Lucian Freud’s studio and artistic environment, concentrating on the relationship between the painter and his models. By delving into this relationship in images hung in the apartment of Lucian Freud’s grandfather Sigmund, the presentation explores similarities and differences to the situation encountered in the latter’s practice, developed here at Berggasse 19. A crucial distinction remains between the two narratives: the visual depiction of the painter contrasts with the spoken word of the psychoanalyst.

Lucian Freud
Until his death in 2011, Lucian Michael Freud was widely considered to be one of the greatest living exponents of figurative painting. He was born on 8 December 1922 in
Berlin as the second child of Lucie and Ernst Freud. His father, Sigmund Freud’s youngest son and the fourth of his sixth children, pursued a successful career as an architect in Berlin after completing his studies and marrying in Vienna. With the rise of National Socialism the family fled to London in 1933, where Ernst Freud experienced difficulties in establishing himself as an architect, this exerting a substantial influence on the development and shaping of Lucian’s artistic gift, which he already displayed in childhood. Sigmund Freud promoted his grandson’s artistic talent from an early age. Biographers describe the relationship between the artist and his grandfather as being close; film material documenting it can be seen at the Sigmund Freud Museum.