13 truly terrifying works of art
Art is famous for its beauty, but there is enough ugliness in it, even in the works of the most famous artists. Not to mention blood, guts and existential horror. So, we present you 13 creepy pictures!
"The Figure with meat", Francis Bacon (1954). The painting is an allusion to the portrait of Pope Innocent X by Diego Velasquez.
"A Few Little Pinches", Frida Kahlo (1935). This picture is based on newspaper news about how a man killed his girlfriend by stabbing her 20 times. When he was questioned, he said: "I just pinched her a little!"
"The Face of War", Salvador Dali (1940). This is Dali's most terrifying surreal work, written immediately after the end of the Spanish Civil War.
"Saturn Devouring His Son," Francisco Goya (1819-1823). It is based on the Greek myth of the Crown eating its children so that they do not overthrow it (one of them survived and did exactly that — well, you know Zeus). This is one of the canvases that Goya painted right on the walls of his house.
"A child with a toy grenade", Diane Arbus (1962). Many of Arbus' works are scary, but this one is especially scary. Diana walked around the child, Colin Wood, and filmed him at the moment when he was tired of it. "Take a photo already!" he shouted.
Judith and Holofernes, Caravaggio (1598-1599). Many artists have painted this scene, but it seems to us that Caravaggio's painting is the scariest.
Gustav Klimt (1901). Pay attention to Typhon, the scariest monster in Greek mythology, and humanoid creatures: they embody illness, madness, death (left), promiscuity, voluptuousness and excess (right).
"A Thousand Years", Damien Hirst (1990). Whatever you think about Hearst, he is, firstly, famous, and secondly, terrifying, because he is on the list. This is a picture of life cycles: flies lay eggs in a severed cow's head, the eggs turn into larvae and die again from a fly swatter.
The Lovers, Rene Magritte (1928). You and your boyfriend dressed up for Halloween and decided that if you don't see anyone, no one sees you either.
"Untitled #140", Cindy Sherman (1985). Almost all of her works are scary, but this is probably the most terrible.
"Egg", Alfred Kubin (1901-1902). The symbolist Kubin was obsessed with the female body as the body of both the victim and the aggressor, and often painted death and pregnancy together.
"Suicide", Andy Warhol (1964). In the early 60s, Warhol became interested in all sorts of horrors. This is a work from the series "Death and Catastrophe".
"Three studies to the figures at the foot of the crucifixion", Francis Bacon (1944). Sorry, Bacon again. From this picture it becomes uncomfortable. Bacon was obsessed with religious motifs and iconography and planned to depict the whole crucifixion scene. This triptych is his first mature work.