Bacon To Sizzle At Auction

Christie's auctioneers expect to achieve a record price for a work by Dublin-born painter Francis Bacon at a London auction in February, when his "Study For Portrait II" goes under the hammer. Calling it one of the most important works by Bacon to appear at auction, Christie's unveiled the papal portrait on Monday. A spokeswoman said the painting was expected to fetch about 12 million pounds ($23 million), which would easily eclipse the current record for the artist of $15 million set in November at Sotheby's in New York for the work "Version No. 2 of Lying Figure With Hypodermic Syringe". According to Christie's, Bacon painted more than 50 paintings of popes, beginning in 1946, and was obsessed by Diego Velazquez's 1650 "Portrait of Pope Innocent X". Unlike his more dramatic "screaming Popes" from the early 1950s, the 1956 work on sale is a more sympathetic image of the pope as a tragic hero. Irish Art