Contextual Studies

Name: Melissa King
Tutor's name: Matt Moseley
Word count: 511 Words

Contextual Studies visual analysis of pair 2
Francis Bacon and Giacommetti.

In my essay, I am going to analyse two pieces of art work. The first is a still from Battleship Potemkin 1925 dir Eisenstein and the second piece is a Self portrait by Francis Bacon in 1971. I am going to discuss what they represent, what they refer and how they are made.

The screen shot from Battleship Potemkin 1925 dir Eisenstein which is a silent film directed by Sergei Eisenstein. The screen shot is from Battleship Potemkin refers to the mutiny that occurred during 1905 when a Russian crew from the battleship rebelled against the Tsarist regime officers. The black and white pictured image represents a woman, with her eyes and mouth wide open expressing the look on her face strongly being of fear or horror of the event accruing in front of her. I think the Battleship Potemkin by Sergei Eisenstein means that the women in the screen shot is scared and shocked of what is happening before her eyes. The fact the image is rather dark, due to it being a black and white film, around her facial features expressing more than one particular emotion. I like how this effect has been done because it leaves the viewers of the image/film to imagine what may have happened.

The second image I am going to analyse is Self Portrait 1971 by Fancis Bacon, which is an oil painting done on to canvas. His Self Portrait represents how he saw himself and how he believed other people saw him. The bright colours on the face are distinctive and allow the different shapes to come through the image. Bacons Self Portrait refers to what he though human facial features looked like in his imagination. I think Francis Bacons 1971 Self Portrait means in everyone’s eyes we are all seen differently compared to others and the shapes of our facial features can be more expressive in comparison to others peoples.

Both Eisenstein and Bacon use different elements that both of there pieces of work have in common. The texture in both creates them to be more direct and shows the meaning of each of the images, because bacon repeats the colouring and shadowing in his Self Portrait, whereas, Eisenstein repeats the shading around the features on the woman’s face. The artists have also used value because Bacon has a very dark coloured background and lighter colours around the face to make the features more expressive and bold. Eisenstein uses value in a similar way, as he has make most of the areas around the face are darker and the background much lighter colour to make a similar effect as Bacons Self Portrait.

Out of both pieces of the artists work, I prefer Battleship Potemkin 1925 dir Eisenstein because the shocking and simplicity of the colours around the facial features to express the true emotion the women feels towards the horror going on in front of her. Although Francis bacons 1971 Self Portrait shows beauty and texture, his expression, however, doesn’t show as much emotion as Eisenstein’s screen shot of Battleship Potemkin 1925.