Francis Bacon talks to Francis Bacon

Francis Bacon revolutionised painting in the 20th century. With Three Studies for Portrait of George Dyer at the Nationalmusée um Fëschmaart, a triptych by the Irish-born British artist is now on view for the first time to the general public in Luxembourg.

This was the opportunity to engage with Francis Bacon through other forms of art and allow new forms of dialogue between the painter, contemporary artists and audiences to emerge. Inspired by his famous interviews, the performance Francis Bacon talks to Francis Bacon is a fictitious monologue about excess, fear, faith, death and beauty.

Conceived by the Luxembourgish director Thierry Mousset, the actor Kristof van Boven will allow visitors a fascinating insight into the background and intellectual world of Bacon's unique artistic work during the Nuit des Musées.

The performance will take place on Saturday, 12 October 2024 at 18:30, 20:30, 22:30, and 23:30.

Interview with Thierry Mousset

Mathieu Delaveau: The arrival of the triptych Three Studies for Portrait of George Dyer by Francis Bacon at the Nationalmusée is a major event in Luxembourg. What moves you about Bacon's work?

Thierry Mousset: I have always been fascinated by Bacon's portraits. They show us what lies within ourselves, they open us up to our vulnerabilities, our scars, our cracks – in a very visceral and immediate way. A bit like mirrors, perhaps.

MD: This parallel between the painting and the mirror is interesting, as it highlights the importance of the connection between the artwork and the viewer. How did this intimate connection, which also resonates with the way Bacon conceived his artistic gesture, guide your conception of the performance Francis Bacon talks to Francis Bacon?

TM: Perhaps it’s Bacon’s attentiveness to his own emotions in relation to those dear to him that allows him to transcend mere illustrative representation and touch the viewer. In our performance, we also aim to create the conditions for an emotional encounter between the work and the spectator – thanks to an intimate connection with the audience in a small space, where the contact is direct with the actor.

MD: What I find interesting is that the performance doesn’t directly address Bacon's triptych. Yet it’s precisely this gap that activates our gaze.

TM: I don’t want the performance to turn into a simple guided tour. Children, for example, often react sensitively to what they see. They draw to express what they feel. We too allow ourselves the freedom to respond to art with art, without competing with the artist. Kristof van Boven, who performs the piece, asked me during our initial discussions: how can I exist alongside this painting without being overwhelmed? Finding that balance interests me. I’m very grateful to the museum for giving us the opportunity to engage in an artistic dialogue. It’s also a way to make Museum Night a space for exchange and creation.

MD: How did this living voice of Bacon come to life?

TM: I don’t claim to be an expert on Bacon, many people are better informed than me. However, I wanted to start from my own feelings and the painter's words. I gathered and reworked excerpts from interviews that touched on issues close to my heart – death, art, faith, the question of meaninglessness. For the performance, I didn’t want to fall into the trap of a biopic-style incarnation; these words are spoken by an actor who is clearly not Bacon. It’s this gap that interests me and allows for a distance from Bacon's words – and thus invites questioning. These words broaden our view of the triptych because they go beyond the biographical dimension of his relationship with George Dyer and evoke fundamental aspects of our existence, such as violence, desire, and fear.

MD: Bacon seems keen not to impose a meaning on the viewer. "The moment the story is elaborated, the boredom sets in; the story talks louder than the paint," he says. Was this also a challenge for your performance?

TM: Yes, that phrase highlights the challenge of expressing feelings and ideas without letting the narrative take over. It’s a real artistic problem. The choice of performance is a response to this issue – it’s about creating a space for accidents, a place where the unexpected can emerge.

MD: At the start of your performance, Bacon seems surprised by what he is painting. Then his tone becomes much more assertive. Bacon uses a universal “you.” How do you perceive this evolution in your performance?

TM: At first, there’s this moment of doubt, of searching, and eventually, he expresses deeper convictions, which he might be trying to convince himself of in the flow of his own speech. This “you” is a concrete address that establishes a direct link with the audience. Bacon is assertive, but he’s also searching – with us! In the performance, we try to bring out this back-and-forth between searching and asserting.

MD: I’m particularly moved by this declaration of absolute sincerity: “people have been dying around me like flies and I’ve had nobody else left to paint but myself.” You can almost hear those flies buzzing when you look at the distorted face of Bacon’s triptych, painted though at the beginning of his relationship with his lover...

TM: Yes, indeed. And at the same time, Bacon loved life. He was a very cheerful and surprising character. In our performance, we want to give a form to that richness, to those surprising contradictions that shape our lives.

Mathieu Delaveau is a French writer, dramaturg, and professor. A graduate of the École Normale Supérieure and the University of Cambridge, he holds the agrégation in modern literature and lives in Paris.

About Thierry Mousset

Thierry Mousset (b. 1992) is a director and visual artist from Luxembourg. After studying European Literature at the University of Cambridge and Film at Berkeley, he directed Süden by Julien Green at the Grand Théâtre in Luxembourg, which was invited to the Deutsches Theater in Berlin, the Kurtheater Baden in Switzerland, and the Theater St. Pölten in Austria.

Mousset, along with Thorsten Lensing, adapted the novel Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace at the Volksbühne Berlin. He was the dramaturg at the Salzburg Festival for Verrückt Nach Trost, which was selected by the New York Times as one of the ten best plays of 2022.

He is currently finishing his second short film with Ursina Lardi, Eugénie Anselin, and Sam Louwyck, and has received a Luxembourg Film Fund writing grant for his first narrative feature film. A former Fulbright scholar, Mousset was nominated for the Theatre Award in Luxembourg and currently works between Berlin and Luxembourg.

About Kristof van Boven

Kristof van Boven was born in Lier, Belgium, in 1981. After completing his acting training at the Academy of Arts in Arnhem, he initially worked as a jobbing actor in the Dutch off-theatre scene while developing his own pieces with Linda Olthof and performing with companies including the Toneelgroep Amsterdam and the Noord Nederlands Toneel.

In 2004, he became a member of the ensemble at the NT Gent and collaborated with directors such as Johan Simons and Peter Verhelst. From 2010/11 to 2015, he was part of the Munich Kammerspiele ensemble, where he worked again with Johan Simons, as well as with choreographer Meg Stuart, directors Luk Perceval, René Pollesch, Sebastian Nübling, and Tian Gebing.

His role in Johan Simons' production Winterreise earned Kristof van Boven the 2011 'Young Actor of the Year' award, presented by Theater heute magazine. Furthermore, in 2012, he was awarded the Art Prize by the Academy of Arts in Berlin in the category of performing arts, and in 2013, he received the Gordana-Kosanovic Prize for Acting from the Theater Mülheim an der Ruhr.