Francis Bacon, perhaps the last of the great painters of the human figure, portrayed the world as a place of theatrical drama in which the body took center stage, sensuous and terrible. A lifelong student of color, form, and brushwork, he created an art at once classical and modern, ordered and chaotic, in which human emotions and passions are imbedded within the harsh realities of the flesh. Who was Bacon? What in his life gave rise to his grand guignol vision of the world? Through photographs, interviews, the artist's own statements, and a multitude of paintings (including six gatefolds), this book offers a rich portrait of a modern master.