ON REFLECTION...

Late on in 2008 I went down to London to see the Francis Bacon exhibition at Tate Britain. Having only recently come to appreciate his work, it was a unique opportunity to see a large number of his paintings together at one time and to get a glimmer of his working process - a feel for his artistic development over a period of time. The exhibition was extremely impressive and one left with a feeling of emotional exhaustion - very powerful works.

One room in particular remains in my mind, being a room hung with dark sombre portraits. 'Man in Blue IV ' shown here was one of them, together with another three or four similar canvases; large ( some 2000mm x 1400mm ), brooding, austere, the canvas sucked you in as you approached, the dark field of background colour enveloping you in its cloak. Except that it didn't, because as you approached you suddenly became aware that the canvas was framed and glazed and your eyes, your focal point suddenly shifted to picking up the reflection of the gallery, the group of three or four people looking at the painting with you, the lighting in the room, the crowds moving through the gallery behind you. It immediately became impossible to appreciate the painting in its state as a independent artifact; it now became a background, a component in a constructed image of the gallery experience. The second and third images posted here, whilst not of the same painting, demonstrates this effect quite clearly.

And this got me thinking - at what point, certainly with contemporary art, does a canvas become glazed, and who decides? It certainly can't have been Bacon's intent, when painting the canvas, to have it viewed in these circumstances - the surface texture, the visceral effect of paint on canvas is now subsumed to a reflective surface that highlights the environment in which the canvas is hanging at any given time. Is it a curatorial issue, a decision by the owners to provide a degree of protection? And why is it deemed necessary? The Rothko 'Four Seasons' suite hanging in the Tate Modern has never - god forbid - seemed to require this treatment and a brief consideration of how their power would instantly be totally compromised by glazing would suggest that it is a fundamental issue when it comes to determining how a canvas should be viewed; an issue moreover that I have to my knowledge not seen discussed elsewhere. Comments please?

Nevertheless, an excellent exhibition and one that lead me on to read 'Francis Bacon's Studio' by Margarita Cappock - a fascinating exploration of Bacon's studio as it was left after his death. Both forensic and archaeological in its depth and scope, it was occasioned by the purchase of the studio by Dublin City Gallery and its subsequent dismantling, removal from South Kensington and reconstruction in Dublin, where it is now on permanent display. Leaving aside the more esoteric question of ' is it now still the real studio?', another curatorial debate, as an investigation and analysis of his working methods it reveals far more about Bacon than perhaps he would ever have wished. It remains silent, however, on the enigma of the glazing...