Rare Bacon To Edinburgh

A long-lost work by artist Francis Bacon is to go on display in Scotland after laying hidden in an Iranian vault for more than 25 years. Reclining Man with Sculpture 1960-1961 was discovered by the British Council in a museum in Iran last year. It will go on show in the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh on 4 June. The piece was kept in the bowels of the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art after the fall of the Shah of Iran in 1979. The former Iranian leader bought the painting in the mid-70s and when he was overthrown it became the property of the new Islamic Republic. It was kept in the vaults throughout the period of the Islamic Revolution until it was spotted by a UK art expert. One of Bacon's more unusual works, it shows a man lying on a sofa with a coffee table in front of him and a sculpted head sitting in profile on the table. For the full story - click the title Irish Art