British Artist Lucian Freud Dies at 88

Lucien Freud, 2005 (Photo: procsilas)

British Artist Lucian Freud Dies at 88
Thursday, 21 July 2011

British artist Lucian Freud, grandson of the founder of modern psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud, has died. He was 88 years old.

The painter's New York art dealer, William Acquavella, says Freud passed away Wednesday night at his home in London after an unspecified illness.

Lucian Freud was famous for his dramatic self-portraits and paintings of nude women. He also was commissioned to paint a portrait of Britain's Queen Elizabeth.

In recent years, his paintings have sold for huge sums. In 2008, his portrait of a civil servant, entitled “Benefits Supervisor Sleeping,” fetched close to $34 million at Christie's auction house in New York. It was a record price paid for a painting by a living artist.

The buyer was later reported to be Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich.

Freud was born in 1922 in Berlin, and his family moved to Britain in 1933 to escape the rise of Nazism in Germany. After a brief stint as a seaman in the British Navy in 1941, he devoted himself to art.

Known for such paintings as “The Painter's Room,” “Girl With a White Dog,” and “Self-Portrait With a Black Eye,” Freud is considered to be one of the most significant painters of his time.