Queer Juxtapositions in the Art of Francis Bacon and Lilliput Magazine

Abstract

Francis Bacon made extensive use of photographs and other images from the visual culture of his time in the production of works that were implicitly queer. Homosexual men were widely represented in prose and through cartoons as camply effeminate ‘pansies’. In the magazine Lilliput, by contrast, photographic spreads produced juxtapositions that evoked a range of responses to same-sex attraction from erotic engagement to nervous rejection. Studying the ways in which this and other magazines engaged with queer culture enables us to reassess the painter’s use of juxtaposed visual forms as acts of sexualized self-expression.

Keywords:

• Cartoons
• collage
• homosexuality
• magazines
• photography

Acknowledgements

Thanks are due to Dr Andrew Rudd, who brought Figure 3 to my attention.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Hornsey, The Spiv, 151.

2 Bryant, ‘A Little Magazine’.

3 Woodhouse, Angus McBean, 168.

4 Hallett, Stefan Lorant, 67.

5 Hammer, Francis Bacon, 66.

6 Sontag, in Against Interpretation, 269.

7 Sontag, ‘Notes on “Camp”’.

8 Sinfield, The Wilde Century, 146.

9 Woods, Homintern, 165–89.

10 Acton, Memoirs, 163–4.

11 For example, Stephens, ‘Seeing the Story’.

12 Hammer, Francis Bacon, 188–9.

13 Anon., ‘Polish Clothing’, 95.

14 Alloway, ‘Pop Art’, 1085.

15 Harrison, ‘Potential Images’, 58.

16 Walsh, ‘Real Imagination’, 85; for an overview see Robbins, The Independent Group and Massey, The Independent Group.

17 Janes, ‘Cecil Beaton’.

18 Beaton, ‘People and Ideas’, 140.

19 Ives, Clippings Album 3, p. 1, Beinecke Library, Yale University, general mss 426. These scrapbooks are not precisely dated but this material is from around c.1900–05.

20 George Platt Lynes Papers, Beineke Library, Yale University, YCAL mss 139, box 3, folder 23.

21 Ibid., box 2, folder 20.

22 Weinberg, ‘“Boy Crazy”’, 32.

23 O’Connor, Straight Acting, 131.

24 Hussey, ‘Clive Bell’, 244 and 255, n. 11.

25 Janes, Oscar Wilde Prefigured.

26 Janes, Oscar Wilde Prefigured, 199–205.

27 Nichols, ‘The Devil’; thanks are due to Dr Andrew Rudd for bringing this cartoon to my attention.

28 Morton, ‘Conscription’, 11.

29 Anon., ‘B. W.’, ‘Men Only’, 13.

30 Bengry, ‘Courting’, 134–5.

31 Bengry, ‘Courting’, 122, fig. 1.

32 Hynes, ‘“Oh, Sir”’, 95; see also Bengry, ‘Courting’, 133, fig. 3.

33 Bengry, ‘Courting’, 142.

34 Hynes, ‘“Oh Mummy”’, 69.

35 Hynes, ‘“I Say”’, 91, emphasis in original.

36 Anon., ‘Palmer’, ‘Frankly Speaking’, 42.

37 Peppiatt, Francis Bacon, 60; see also Weeks, ‘Inverts’, and Bartley, Prostitution, 25, 30 and 157.

38 Moran and McGhee, ‘Perverting London’, 104–6.

39 Houlbrook, ‘“The Man”’, 170.

40 Houlbrook, ‘Lady Austin’s’, 39.

41 Quoted in Peppiatt, Francis Bacon, 69, emphasis in original.

42 Humphreys quoted in Houlbrook, Queer London, 139.

43 Bérubé, Coming Out, 97.

44 Rose, Which People’s War, 154.

45 Reynolds, ‘“Fall in that Poet”’, 386.

46 Black Star, ‘Keep out’, 154–5.

47 Dyhouse, Glamour, 105.

48 Anon., ‘High Court’; an appeal was allowed but was not pursued, on which see Anon., ‘Court of Appeal’, 2.

49 Lynes, ‘Slumbering Sailors’.

50 Beaton, ‘A Fanciful’, 81.

51 Ewing, The Photographic Art, p. 186, plate 132.

52 Beaton, ‘Able Seaman’, 85; see also Stephenson, ‘“Our Jolly”’.

53 Hammer, Francis Bacon, 174.

54 Quoted in Vickers, Cecil Beaton, 134.

55 Princeton University Library, Cecil Beaton Papers, box 1, folder 12, for correspondence on this incident.

56 Francis, ‘Cecil Beaton’s Romantic Toryism’, 92–3.

57 Topical, ‘Boxers’, 450–1.

58 Ofield, ‘Wrestlng’, and Arya, ‘Constructions of Homosexuality’, 52–3.

59 Salter, ‘Francis Bacon’, 85.

60 Marshik, At the Mercy, 104, fig. 3.1.

61 Halberstam, The Queer Art, 170.

62 Halberstam, The Queer Art, 158.

63 McDonnell, ‘Essentially Masculine’, and Tobin, Peripheral Desires, 188.

64 Hill, ‘Ganymede’, 283.

65 Harrison, ‘A Nation’, 7; compare Anon., ‘Gospel’, 7.

66 Tobin, Peripheral Desires, 4.

67 Beachy, ‘The German’, 828.

68 Hewitt, Political Inversions.

69 Fox, ‘Everything’, 520–1.

70 Der wahre Jacob (November 26, 1907), reproduced in Steakley, ‘Iconography’, 336.

71 Weinberg, ‘“Boy Crazy”’, 31.

72 Hornsey, The Spiv, 161.

73 Hornsey, The Spiv, 137, and Janes, ‘The Scene’.

74 Hammer, Francis Bacon, 156; Salter, ‘Francis Bacon’, 91, and Van Alphen, Francis Bacon, 175.

75 Lorant, Chamberlain.

76 Moma, Francis Bacon.

77 Janes, Picturing the Closet, 151.

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Dominic Janes

Dominic Janes is Professor of Modern History at Keele University, UK. He is a cultural historian who studies texts and visual images relating to Britain in its local and international contexts since the eighteenth century. Within this sphere, he focuses on the histories of gender, sexuality and religion. His most recent books are Oscar Wilde Prefigured: Queer Fashioning and British Caricature, 1750–1900 (University of Chicago Press, 2016) and Freak to Chic: ‘Gay’ Men in and out of Fashion after Oscar Wilde (Bloomsbury Visual, in press). He has been the recipient of several research awards including fellowships from the AHRC and the British Academy.