FB55

FB55 is an archival display of Francis Bacon’s exhibition held at ICA's former premises on Dover Street in 1955. It was Bacon’s first ever solo institutional show in the UK. The presentation in the ICA Fox Reading Room includes a display of materials such as press reviews, invitation cards and related publications.

Having represented Britain at the Venice Biennale the previous year, alongside Lucian Freud and Ben Nicholson, hardly any documentation survives and surprisingly little is known of Bacon’s 1955 ICA show. The exhibition was organised with the help of philanthropist, collector and ICA founder Peter Watson - then the richest man in Britain and a longstanding Bacon supporter, whose death a year later was shrouded in mystery.