Lucian Freud’s crayon period: childhood drawings reveal his early artistic promise

The card can now be seen at a new exhibition charting the life of the great artist. The show opened this week at the Freud Museum in Hampstead, once the home of Lucian’s grandfather, Sigmund Freud.

The exhibition will feature many works, including paintings, book covers, cards and photographs that have rarely been seen in public, if at all.

The hand-drawn birthday card to his father, eminent architect Ernst, is among the items on display.

In another imaginatively illustrated card to his father, undated but likely to be from around 1934, Lucian draws not only his own recent adventures swimming, but also what he imagines his father’s job as an architect to entail.

The translation reads: “Dear Pap, I have just been swimming. I’m already quite good. [On the sign:] Only for swimmers. We have put up the model railway. Have you already built the skyscraper? [The skyscraper says:] “Scratch me until I break, cloud, then unemployed Mr Freud can build me up again.

“Give my love to Uncle Olli from your Lux.”

One of Lucian’s early works as an artist — a painting of a palm tree — hangs discreetly on the chimney breast of the dining room at the museum at No 20 Maresfield Gardens.

The painting is said to represent what the museum curators describe as “a complex set of family relationships that are part of the story of this place”. Lucian Freud: The Painter and His Family explores these family connections to create “an intriguing and intimate exhibition” , according to the curators.

Sigmund Freud and his family fled from Nazi persecution of Jews in Austria to London in 1938.  Ernst was already living in London with his wife and their three sons, including Lucian.

Ernst arranged the purchase of 20 Maresfield Gardens, and helped his parents and sister Anna settle into their new life in the UK. Sigmund worked at the house in a unique environment of his own making, surrounded by his books, his antiquities, and the original psychoanalytic couch. The psychoanalyst’s grandsons, including Lucian, were frequent visitors.

Today the property is a popular London historic house museum with a global audience, known for its innovative education and public programmes.

Lucian was born in Berlin in 1922 and moved to London with his Ernst and his mother Lucie in 1933. In 1938, Ernst and his younger sister, Anna, moved into their father Sigmund’s Hampstead home.  Ernst remodelled aspects of the house, including the creation of a glazed garden room.

Lucian Freud was to become arguably the greatest painter of his generation. His artistic brilliance was matched by a tempestuous private life, and his notorious proclivity for gambling, particularly on horse racing. He died aged 88 in 2011.

Carol Seigel, the museum’s director, said: “The Freud Museum has also developed an impressive reputation for its imaginative, wide-ranging exhibitions about psychoanalysis and its history, and by contemporary artists engaging with psychoanalytic themes.

“The museum has never before now mounted an exhibition of works by Sigmund’s grandson, one of the most famous artists of recent years.

“Apart from The Palm Tree, bought by Lucian’s aunt Anna at one of his first exhibitions, the museum holds in its archives personal material such as illustrated childhood letters, and family photographs. This material forms the kernel of the exhibition to mark the centenary of Lucian’s birth.

“Taking the theme of family connections, the exhibition explores in the Freud family home the artist’s childhood and complicated relations with his parents, grandparents, and his own children.”

A portrait of Lucian’s mother Lucie will hang over Sigmund Freud’s couch, reminding the visitor of both Sigmund’s revolutionary exploration of parent- child dynamics, and of Lucian’s complex relationship with his own mother. The museum director said: “Elsewhere in the exhibition, the voices of some of Lucian’s children are heard, shedding light on their own relations with their father.

“We are proud to be showing this new exhibition, which we hope will attract visitors and interest from the UK and beyond. It is an important step for the Freud Museum to take as we open our doors again as widely as possible following the Covid-19 pandemic.

“The museum is very grateful to the exhibition’s curator, Martin Gayford —author, art historian and critic — for his generous and inspired work. The project has expanded considerably from its inception, largely due to Martin’s research, enthusiasm, and untiring assistance.

“We would like to thank all the lenders for their generous support. Particular thanks go to Bella Freud, Esther Freud, Annie Freud, Rose Boyt, Susie Boyt and Ali Boyt, who not only loaned material but shared memories of their father.”

Lucian Freud: The Painter and His Family, until 29 January 2023, Freud Museum London, 20 Maresfield Gardens, London NW3 5SX, Freud.org.uk