★★★★☆
Two portrait shows go head-to-head this month. In one corner, dazzlingly lit, is John Singer Sargent at Tate Britain. In the other, sunk in shadows, is Frank Auerbach at the Courtauld Gallery. Frank Auerbach: The Charcoal Heads is a succinct and certain show. It knows what it wishes to say and does so crisply and persuasively.
Head of Helen Gillespie II, 1962
© THE ARTIST, COURTESY OF FRANKIE ROSSI ART PROJECTS, LONDON
Over the course of the 1950s and early 1960s, Auerbach, now 92, drew a series of large-scale charcoal portraits. He sketched, scraped, rubbed them raw and ripped the paper with the force of his revisions. Since the Renaissance, artists have used charcoal as a swift and summary medium, setting down first thoughts to be later revised in paint. Auerbach’s charcoal is insistent, obsessive, dense and dissatisfied. After each
