When British painter Lucian Freud died in late July at age 88 (read his obituary here that appeared in The New York Times), a collective sigh could be heard around the art world. 

It's clear that Freud held little respect for people who dared not be original and that's why perhaps artists who are original often quoted him.  A few favorite Freud observations that I've heard painters and sculptors invoke over the years:

° "The longer you look at an object, the more abstract it becomes, and, ironically, the more real."

° "A painter's tastes must grow out of what so obsesses him in life that he never has to ask himself what it is suitable for him to do in art."

° "I remember Francis Bacon would say that he felt he was giving art what he thought it previously lacked. With me, it's what Yeats called the fascination with what's difficult. I'm only trying to do what I can't do."

° "There is a distinction between fact and truth. Truth has an element of revelation about it. If something is true, it does more than strike one as merely being so."

Was it a matter of coincidence that he was the grandson of Sigmund Freud, the godfather of psychoanalysis or part of a family legacy to search for deeper hidden meaning in the human unconscious?  Regardless, there is indeed an intensity in his interpretations.

Freud's figurative works of the flesh were considered biographical and Realistic, in that they chronicled those who modeled for him, people ranging from family members to the rich and famous and others he encountered on the street.  Like the late Andrew Wyeth, he painted what was close to him.

The work here is titled  "Self Portrait With A Black Eye."  The injury was caused during a run-in with a taxi driver.  The painting sold for $4.4 million in auction at Sotheby's London in 2010

Enjoy this interview with Freud that coincided with an opening of works in Paris.