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Francis Bacon's Figure in Movement Heads to Christie's New York with $50M Estimate

market-auction · 2026-04-27

Christie's 20th Century Evening Sale on November 9, 2023 at Rockefeller Center in New York will feature Francis Bacon's Figure in Movement, estimated at $50 million. Painted in 1976, the work is part of Bacon's output following the 1971 death of his lover George Dyer. It comes to auction for the first time after nearly half a century in a single collection. The painting was exhibited alongside the black triptychs at Bacon's first solo show at a French institution outside Paris, the Musée Cantini in Marseille, and later featured in retrospectives at Tate Gallery, Museo Correr, and Centre Georges Pompidou, as well as the 2018 Bacon – Giacometti exhibition at Fondation Beyeler in Basel. Figure in Movement dialogues with the black triptychs, exploring love, loss, and mortality. The composition merges Dyer's features with Bacon's own on a black background. Dyer and Bacon met in a pub in 1963; Dyer became Bacon's muse and was found dead in their hotel room at the Hôtel des Saints-Pères days before Bacon's 1971 retrospective at the Grand Palais in Paris.

Key facts

  • Figure in Movement by Francis Bacon will be auctioned at Christie's 20th Century Evening Sale on November 9, 2023.
  • The auction takes place at Rockefeller Center in New York.
  • The pre-sale estimate is around $50 million.
  • The painting was created in 1976, after the death of George Dyer in 1971.
  • It is being offered at auction for the first time, having been in the same collection for nearly 50 years.
  • The work was first exhibited at Musée Cantini in Marseille, alongside the black triptychs.
  • It was later included in retrospectives at Tate Gallery, Museo Correr, and Centre Georges Pompidou.
  • In 2018, it was shown at the Bacon – Giacometti exhibition at Fondation Beyeler in Basel.

Entities

Artists

  • Francis Bacon
  • George Dyer

Institutions

  • Christie's
  • Musée Cantini
  • Tate Gallery
  • Museo Correr
  • Centre Georges Pompidou
  • Fondation Beyeler
  • Grand Palais
  • Hôtel des Saints-Pères

Locations

  • New York
  • Rockefeller Center
  • Marseille
  • Paris
  • Basel
  • Switzerland

Sources