Biography
Grandson of the distinguished psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, Lucien Freud was born in Berlin and came to England with his parents in 1932. He joined the Merchant Navy during the Second World War, but was injured in 1942, when he became a full-time artist.

He is now one of the most powerful contemporary figurative painters; his subjects are stripped naked psychologically (usually literally as well) so that the reader of the painting feels there is nothing to hide, in much the same way as a psychoanalyst works with his patient. He normally knows his models well; he knows their flesh, and even concocts special shades of white paint to capture the shade of their skin. Many regard him as the best living British painter, including his contemporary Peter Blake.