![Meeting a pantheon of the greatest painters in Francis Bacon's studio.](http://mathieulaca.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/7-Reece-Mews-oil-on-linen-67x91-2017-1-1024x758.jpg)
7 Reece Mews (Cézanne, Francis Bacon, Giacometti and Rembrandt), oil on linen, 67”X91”, 2017
7 Reece Mews: A Mystical Meeting of Painters in Francis Bacon's Studio
In this transcendent scene, I visit Francis Bacon's studio to look in on an imagined meeting between a pantheon of familiar faces.
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Francis Bacon has influenced and faithfully accompanied me throughout my career.
Like a talisman, he is for me an endless source of inspiration, standing as a bulwark against all doubt.
What I would give to be able to visit him in his studio at 7 Reece Mews in London. Yet that is precisely one of the functions of art: to open up spaces for imaginative leaps into fantasies.
And so I painted myself into his studio, adding other great artists—without regard for chronological possibility—Cezanne, Giacometti and Rembrandt.
![](http://mathieulaca.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Cézanne-détail_b-1024x681.jpg)
![Déail Giacometti_b](http://mathieulaca.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Déail-Giacometti_b-1024x681.jpg)
![Détail(Autoportrait)](http://mathieulaca.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/DétailAutoportrait.jpg)
![Détail(Francis Bacon)](http://mathieulaca.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/DétailFrancis-Bacon-1024x681.jpg)
![](http://mathieulaca.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/DétailRembrandt-1024x681.jpg)
At first glance, the painting pays homage to the great masters and the craft of painting. However, to remind the viewer that I am the visitor and painter of this fantasy, I positioned my reflection in a mirror at the back of the room.
As if I were the model they are all about to paint, the work is a playful wink to Vélasquez’s Ménines, representing a self-portrait within a group portrait that blurs the boundary between painter and model, looking and being seen, self and community, personal vision and artistic inheritances.
This piece now hangs in a private collection in the Philippines.
![](http://mathieulaca.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/laca-chals-signature-300x163.jpg)
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