The parisian gallery owner Claude Bernard was the discoverer of the painter in France. A thunderbolt for the work that turned into a great friendship for the man. Memories.

Claude Bernard. Galerie Claude Bernard

LE FIGARO. – How did you met Francis Bacon?

Claude BERNARD. – I first bought a painting in a gallery in London, the Hanover Gallery, an array that was not “Bacon”, a patio Arabic painted at Tangier, where he lived one year. I had the thunderbolt. Funny thing is, I had showed at Jean Fournier (the “gallerist lover of the colour”, 1922-2006, editor’s NOTE) who had hated it. Bacon knew my purchase by the gallery, he came to see me in Paris. First impressions? Great elegance, inner strength, born in Dublin, but very british of ways, speaking perfect French. It felt like someone lived, it is rarely found. Then, we have greatly seen. A great friendship has bound my sister’s (Nadine Haim, ED.), friendship and maternal painful, because Bacon …

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