1970
In March, Bacon stays in Wivenhoe, returning there in late August.
In April, he attends the installation of Matisse’s ‘Centennial Exhibition’ in the Grand Palais, Paris.
In September, George Dyer deliberately hides cannabis in Bacon’s studio at 7 Reece Mews and turns him in for drug possession.
1971
The first monograph on Bacon, written by John Russell, is published under the title Francis Bacon.
In January, Bacon visits Monaco.
On 14 April, his mother dies in South Africa.
On 2 June, Bacon is acquitted of all charges against him for possession of cannabis. It has been shown that he could not have smoked a drug of this kind, given his asthma.
27 October 1971 – 10 January 1972: Bacon is privileged to be granted, at 62, a retrospective at the Grand Palais, Paris. This exhibition marks his consecration in the French capital and represents one of the most important moments of his career. On 24 October, two days before the opening of the show, George Dyer is found dead in the bathroom of his room in the Hotel des Saints-Pères. The Grand Palais exhibition is also to be shown at the Kunsthalle, Düsseldorf, Germany (7 March – 7 May 1972).
On 8 November, Bacon attends Dyer’s funeral.
In November, he paints the first of his ‘Black Triptychs’, a series of three large triptychs in homage to George Dyer.
© André Morain
1972
In January, Bacon spends time on the Côte d’Azur.
In March, he stays in Wivenhoe.
In April, Bacon, Denis Wirth-Miller and Richard Chopping travel France, visiting Chartres, Cherbourg and Dinard.
On 25 May, John Deakin dies in Brighton.
In November, Bacon goes to Madrid.
The director Bernardo Bertolucci uses Bacon’s paintings in the opening credits of Last Tango in Paris. The film, with its explicit sexual content, is inspired by Bacon’s world.
1973
In January, Bacon is in Wivenhoe.
In February, he visits Paris.
On 6 March, Hugh M. Davies interviews the artist for his thesis.
That spring, Bacon invites William Burroughs and Hugh M. Davies to lunch at his home.
1974
In January, Bacon is in Wivenhoe.
The artist begins to visit Paris more regularly. In September, he takes a studio and living quarters at 14 rue de Birague, near the Place des Vosges in the Marais neighbourhood. He moves there in 1975.
On 1 May, Bacon dines with Denis Wirth-Miller and David W. Boxer, who is writing a thesis entitled The Early Work of Francis Bacon.
On 22 June, Bacon dines with David Sylvester and the writer, poet and gallery-owner Jacques Dupin.
In July, Bacon travels in south-western France. On 14 July, he spends the day in Gradignan, near Bordeaux, at the home of the art historian and photographer Jacques Saraben, with Denis Wirth-Miller and Richard Chopping. He also visits the Goya Museum in Castres.
In October, he invites David Sylvester and Sonia Orwell to lunch at his home.
In December, he is in Wivenhoe.
© Jacques Saraben
1975
Bacon meets the art historian Eddy Batache and the art consultant Reinhard Hassert, who are to be his closest friends and confidants for the last seventeen years of his life.
In March, he goes to New York for his exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which runs from 20 March to 29 June.
During the summer, Bacon purchases a house at 68 Queen’s Road, Wivenhoe, not far from his friends Denis Wirth‑Miller and Richard Chopping.
Interviews with Francis Bacon, by David Sylvester, is published by Thames & Hudson.
1976
Bacon meets John Edwards, who becomes his companion and model, then his close friend until his death.
In late June, Bacon goes to Marseilles, where an exhibition is devoted to him at the Musée Cantini, from 9 July to 30 September. He attends the private view on 9 July.
On 27 November, Bacon is in Wivenhoe with Denis Wirth-Miller, Richard Chopping, Eddy Batache and Reinhard Hassert.
1977
Bacon goes to Rome with Claude Bernard to meet Balthus, who is the director of the Villa Medici.
19 January – 26 March: An exhibition of Bacon’s recent works is organised at the Galerie Claude Bernard, Paris. Michel Leiris writes the preface of the exhibition catalogue. The exhibition is so successful that the police have to close the rue des Beaux-Arts to divert traffic.
On 18 July, Bacon dines with David Sylvester in Paris.
In December, Bacon travels to Vaux-le-Vicomte with Eddy Batache and Reinhard Hassert.
October – December: An exhibition of Bacon’s works is organised in Mexico. It is subsequently to be shown in Caracas, Venezuela, beginning in February 1978.
Bacon spends the end of the year in Monaco.
1978
Bacon has a show in Madrid, at the Fundación Juan March (14 April – 28 May), then another in Barcelona, at the Fundació Joan Miró (2 June – 16 July).
In the spring, Bacon is in Wivenhoe while renovation work is being carried out at 7 Reece Mews.
In May, Bacon visits the Frank Auerbach exhibition at the Hayward Gallery, London with Valerie Beston, one of the directors of Marlborough Fine Art, who is personally to manage the artist until the end of his life.
In June, Bacon is in Paris.
In late July, he travels eastern France with Eddy Batache and Reinhard Hassert. They visit Avallon, Nancy and then Colmar to see the Isenheim Altarpiece (c. 1512 – 1516) by Matthias Grünewald.
Bacon spends late summer in Paris and goes to Chantilly with Eddy Batache and Reinhard Hassert in September.
On 19 December, Bacon and Denis Wirth-Miller go to Nice, where they stay at the Hotel Westminster until 21 December, and end of the year in Monaco.
© Eddy Batache
1979
In February, Bacon travels from London to Paris by night ferry. He then tours France with Eddy Batache and Reinhard Hassert. Together, they visit Montbazon, Castres, Carcassonne, Avignon, Marseilles, Saint-Paul-de-Vence, Nice (where they stay at the Hotel Windsor), Villefranche-sur-Mer, Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat and Burgundy. They are back in Paris in March.
On 11 April, Richard Avedon takes a series of photographs of Bacon in Paris.
In July, Bacon buys Janet, a three-dimensional cloth head made by the English artist Clare Shenstone, and commissions her to do his portrait. She is to make several drawings and paintings of Bacon.
At some point in the year, the Irish photographer Edward Quinn takes a series of photographs of Bacon’s Paris studio.
Muriel Belcher, the owner of the Colony Room in Soho and a close friend of Bacon, dies on 31 October.
