Faces of Fame: 6 Lucian Freud Portraits of Celebrities Unfiltered

Lucian Freud (1922–2011) was one of the most influential figurative painters of the 20th century. He is known for his portraits that exposed the psychological and physical realities of his subjects. Born in Berlin to an affluent Jewish family, he was the grandson of the famous psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. His family fled Nazi Germany in 1933 when Freud was 10, settling in London.

Early in his career, he experimented with surrealism and fine details before developing his signature thick impasto style, applying paint with great, almost sculptural, intensity. Throughout his career, Freud’s portraits—often of friends, lovers, and fellow artists—captured human vulnerability with honesty, making him a defining force in contemporary portraiture. Here are six famous individuals Freud painted over his career.

1. Francis Bacon

One of Lucian Freud’s most compelling portraits was of fellow painter and friend Francis Bacon (1909–1992). Painted in 1952, Portrait of Francis Bacon captured Bacon’s energy through the meticulous, almost forensic style of Freud’s early career, which required Bacon to sit for three months for the portrait. Unlike Freud’s later thick impasto technique, this portrait was executed with fine brushstrokes. Freud worked on several drawings of Bacon, as well as another painting he began in 1956 that remains unfinished.

The almost 40-year-long friendship between Freud and Bacon was complex and marked by admiration, rivalry, and influence. Interestingly, Bacon’s portraits distorted and disfigured the human form, including Freud’s. Unfortunately, the work was stolen in 1988 from an exhibition in Berlin and has never been recovered, adding mystery surrounding Freud’s vision of Bacon and their relationship.

2. Kate Moss

In the late 1990s, at the height of her fame, Kate Moss (b. 1974) swapped modelling to pose in Lucian Freud’s paint-streaked studio, becoming one of his most unexpected sitters. The result was Naked Portrait 2002, an intimate painting that presented the supermodel not as an untouchable, airbrushed icon but as a real, vulnerable human being and expectant mother.

Freud’s portrait shows Moss reclining nude on a bed, pregnant, her body rendered with thick impasto strokes. There is no glamour—only flesh, exhaustion, and quiet respite. Freud, known for painting close friends and acquaintances, had never before worked with a model of such mainstream celebrity, while Moss had never been portrayed with such rawness.

This portrait is also an example of Freud’s play with irregular canvas shapes—white corners obscure the top left and bottom right edges of the canvas, redefining the bounds of the work and framing Moss. The portrait was auctioned at Christie’s in 2005. It sold for £3.9 million, a record for Freud at the time.

Moss sat for seven-hour sessions over nine months, learning to be disciplined and compliant to Freud’s creative process, resulting in an intimate relationship that lasted until Freud’s death. Moss also left Freud’s studio with tattoos of two small birds on her lower back, inked by the artist himself. The unconventional yet intimate friendship between model and artist will be immortalized in the upcoming biopic, Moss & Freud.

3. David Hockney

When Lucian Freud painted David Hockney (b. 1937) in 2002, it was a meeting of two of Britain’s greatest artists of their time—each with a distinct approach to painting, but bound by a shared fascination with the human experience. The resulting portrait, David Hockney, captures the Yorkshire-born artist seated in Freud’s studio, wearing his signature round glasses.

Unlike Hockney’s bright, fluid paintings, Freud’s portrait is dense and textural, with thick impasto brushstrokes giving weight to Hockney’s aging features. The portrait took over 100 hours to complete. Despite their differing styles, the two artists shared a deep respect for each other, and in this portrait, Freud presents Hockney not as a vibrant chronicler of modern life but as a timeworn figure. David Hockney is a portrait of an artist captured by another artist’s gaze.

4. Leigh Bowery

Lucian Freud’s portraits of Leigh Bowery (1961–1994) are among the most striking in his entire body of work. They are raw, naked, monumental, and utterly unapologetic. Bowery, the Australian-born performance artist and fashion icon, was an unlikely muse for Freud, yet his imposing physique, extravagant costumes, and flamboyant persona made him an ideal subject for the painter’s desire to express the human condition.

In works like Nude with Leg Up (1992) and Leigh Bowery (1991), Freud transformed Bowery into sculpture, his massive body sprawled across the canvas, both vulnerable and dominant. Unlike the constructed personas of Bowery in his performances, Freud’s paintings strip him bare, exposing his physicality.

Freud once remarked, “I found him perfectly beautiful.” Their collaboration was also a personal test for Bowery, who was diagnosed with HIV in the late 1980s and suffered from deteriorating health. Sitting for Freud was a challenge, but it allowed him to fulfill his greatest wish—to become art.

5. Frank Auerbach

Lucian Freud’s portrait of Frank Auerbach (1931–2024) represents an encounter between two artists, both refugees from Berlin, each devoted to capturing the essence of human presence with paint. Auerbach was also known for his thick, almost sculptural impasto technique. In Frank Auerbach, the sitter’s deep-set eyes and furrowed brow are rendered in the artist’s signature muted palette and dense brushstrokes. Unlike Auerbach’s own energetic, almost chaotic handling of paint, Freud’s approach is controlled, methodical, and even psychological.

Freud was an avid collector of art, owning paintings by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot and sculptures by Edgar Degas, but the artist whose work he collected the most was Auerbach. At one point, Freud held the largest private collection of Auerbach’s paintings, a testament to his admiration for his colleague.

The nearly 40-year relationship between Bacon, Auerbach, and Freud—expressed in their portraits of and by one another—speaks to the artistic camaraderie they shared. Their works not only document their friendships but also reveal the intimacy that emerges between artist and sitter during the creative process.

6. Queen Elizabeth II

Freud’s 2001 portrait of Queen Elizabeth II is one of the most unconventional and controversial depictions of the British monarch ever created. Commissioned by the Royal Collection, the small yet lively portrait defied expectations, stripping away the grandeur and idealization often associated with royal portraiture.

Freud presented the Queen in his signature raw, unflinching style—a face lined with age, a stern expression, and features sculpted with thick, sculptural impasto brushstrokes. Despite her royal status and busy schedule, the Queen posed for the portrait for 19 months.

The painting, measuring 23.5 by 15.2 cm (9 1/4 x 6 in.), was met with mixed reactions, with some critics calling it an insult and others praising it for its honesty. While traditionalists scorned Freud’s unembellished approach, the Queen is said to have accepted the portrait with good humor. According to author William Feaver, the Queen told Freud, “Very nice of you to do this. I’ve very much enjoyed watching you mix your colors.” In many ways, the painting exemplifies Freud’s philosophy of painting what he saw, not what was expected.

Lucian Freud’s portraits of famous individuals strip away their calls to fame, revealing subjects that challenge the conventions of celebrity portraiture by rejecting flattery and perfection in favor of depth and truth. In doing so, Freud’s portraits have redefined how we see the famous—not as untouchable, but as humans, both vulnerable and real, captured with the relentless scrutiny of his brush.