Study after Velázquez
Study after Velázquez is a large 1950 panel painting by the Irish-born English artist Francis Bacon. After "Head VI", it is the second of Bacon's long series of paintings influenced by Diego Velázquez's 1650 "Portrait of Innocent X". The panel shows a full length view of the pope, engulfed in vertical folds that may be either the linings of a curtain or the bars of a cage. 

The folds serve to emphasise the figure's isolation, and were drawn from devices used by Edgar Degas in the late 19th century, which Bacon described as "shuttering". He said that, to him the device meant that the "sensation doesn't come straight out at you but slides slowly and gently across".

The painting was intended as part of a series of Popes for an exhibition at the Hanover Gallery in September 1950. Following a crises of confidence, Bacon withdrew and destroyed the canvasses he had been working on. A number of works in the series, including this painting, re-emerged in the late 1990s, and are considered among the finest of his output. Before it re-emerged; it was often reproduced, tantalisingly, from a black and white photograph.
Q154340
Francis Bacon
PER
Q17008923
Head VI
MEDIA
Q297
Diego Velázquez
PER
Q1240092
Portrait of Innocent X
MEDIA
Q101266
pope
PER
Q46373
Edgar Degas
PER
Q30036304
Study after Velázquez
UNK
1950-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
1950
DATE
1650-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
1650
DATE
1950-09-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
September 1950
DATE
1990-01-01T00:00:00Z^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime
1990
DATE
+19^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#decimal
19
NUMBER
creator
inception
depicts
inspired by
creator
inception