Breakfast with Lucian

by Geordie Greig

  In June 2011 the picture of David stopped progressing. And he stopped going out. It was the winding down of a life that had once seemed inextinguishable. It was a farewell that I had never wanted to make.

  One evening on a blistering hot Sunday my son Jasper and I rang the doorbell at Kensington Church Street. One of the brass numbers nailed to the side of the matt-grey front door had come loose, and Jasper tried to press the figure eight back into position on the wall. It dangled helplessly, oddly symbolic, the faltering of Lucian’s lucky number. David opened the door looking flushed, pink shirt roughly tucked in. We knew we were there for the last time, even though this was unsaid.

  We remembered how Lucian had handed a small silver gavel given to him by Henry Wyndham, the chairman of Sotheby’s, to Jasper one day after breakfast when we were sitting around chatting in his house. He had pretended to hammer Jasper’s head with it, playfully darting round him at speed. In the hall the three of us stood and chatted about a fading water stain on the ceiling caused some years back by Lucian overflowing his bath. Lucian liked the rusty stain on the ceiling, and so it had stayed above the paintings by Frank Auerbach. It was like an abstract pattern in its own right, a variation of the high–low mix in his life, priceless paintings hanging on soiled walls, chipped plaster next to eighteenth-century furniture by John Channon.

  The drama of his studio was palpable as soon as you entered the house, with the imposing Auerbach landscapes dimly lit on the walls, past other paintings into the lino-floored kitchen where the bellied bronze Rodin statue, Naked Balzac with Folded Arms, stood on a table, lit by the light pouring in from the French windows into his rear garden.

  There was a heightened sense of quietude as he lay upstairs in bed. Beautiful fresh flowers had been sent, as usual, by Jane Willoughby, but were just beginning to wilt on the table by the front door. For weeks Lucian had been getting weaker as the cancer and old age took their toll. ‘He’s OK, we’re in Clarke’s. Won’t stay long,’ had been a text six days earlier from David. This time it was definitely a visit at home, as his days at Clarke’s were over, the sickness slowly closing in. There was no feeling of a dramatic end, more an ebbing away.

  David locked the front door because Lucian sometimes became restless and confused at night, pulling on his overcoat, but not sure where he was going or what he was doing. He was looked after with extraordinarily tender patience by his friend, who was in constant touch with his doctor. He had been given a morphine patch by Dr Michael Gormley, his private doctor, who was the brother of the sculptor Antony Gormley (whose work Lucian could not stand, as he was never afraid to tell anyone, even Michael Gormley). The pain was being managed and he was allowed a small, regulated dose per hour, the final stand against the ruination of cancer. Some, like his sitter Mark Fisch, felt the cancer had to some extent been caused by his use of the famous lead-filled Cremnitz white paint, which gave the particular tone to all his paintings. If so, he would have wanted it no other way. Painting came first.

  We went up to where he was lying in bed, very perky to see us, offering his usual saluting wave and warm smile. His bare leg stretched out from under the sheets, long and thin and with a bruise on his ankle. He kept it out of the covers to adjust his own body temperature. ‘Exercise,’ he said, commenting on the protruding limb.

  ‘Like a ballerina,’ I joked and he laughed, exaggerating a faux-elegant movement of his leg.

  On the bed lay a brochure showing Lucian’s drawing of a dead rabbit on a chair, to be sold at auction the following week by the collector Kay Saatchi. Jasper flopped on the bed and with a thirteen-year-old’s natural excitement started telling Lucian about a rabbit he had shot at his grandparents’ farm in Hampshire the day before, which we gutted, skinned, cooked and ate. Also for sale at the auction was the portrait of Suzy Boyt. ‘Who is she?’ asked Jasper.

  ‘She is the mother of some of my children,’ he said. ‘That is right, isn’t it?’ he said to David.

  Its estimate is £4 million. David and I tell him we hope it will go for six or seven million.

  Lucian lay pale and wan in his bed, his eyes still bright and darting. Jasper, naturally affectionate, lay close as Lucian playfully stroked his hair. ‘Why am I feeling so ill?’ he asked. ‘My left ball aches and I feel so awful. Have I got an illness?’

  David said, ‘Yes, sort of.’ Lucian was clearly not sure, partly forgetful, sweetly unaware. He was in a mauve shirt, his trousers on the radiator, a tray with a glass and bottle of mineral water beside him. He was very unshaven but not as bearded as he sometimes was. His humour and sharpness were still evident. He listened as we chatted about Jasper’s rabbit and then he congratulated Jasper on passing his exam into Eton. I showed him a photo on my iPhone of Jasper at his school. He asked for his glasses, which David found.

  Jasper asked if the picture hanging opposite the bed (‘The Buggers’) was a Francis Bacon. ‘I have never been so close to one,’ Jasper said. Lucian explained he bought it cheap because it showed something rather rude. Jasper asked if all the other pictures in the room were by Auerbach. Yes, Lucian said, apart from the Jack B. Yeats on the right wall beside the bed. Two Rodins, Meditation and Iris, were subtly enhanced by the sunlight. The double doors into the sitting room were open and Lucian pointed to the Corot, L’ltalienne, ou La Femme ÿ la Manche Jaune above the mantelpiece. Lucian quietly stated that he was not feeling well. Jasper reached out his hand, which Lucian gently took. It was moving to see them giving and receiving comfort.

  The sun was gently streaming in through the wide-open window. ‘It is a beautiful room,’ said Jasper.

  ‘Very, very nice,’ said Lucian. He was mostly at peace, gently joining in, the odd joke, an aside, an aperçu but all refracted through a veil of affliction. David was seated by the window, Jasper and I on the bed. As we left him to have a nap, Jasper kissed his hand. ‘Au revoir, see you soon, auf wiedersehen,’ Lucian waved and lay back. It was the final goodbye. As we walked downstairs, we knew we would never see him again.

  Two weeks later, Lucian died.

  * * *

  On the night of his death, the builder and the brigadier were having dinner with David Dawson at Clarke’s. As they sat and reminisced, Lucian was breathing his last a few doors away, some of his children with him. Pat Doherty remembered how Lucian had thrown bread rolls in Clarke’s to get attention. ‘He was a mischief-maker.’ At 10.30 p.m. Lucian died as his friends sat there together for the last time. A telephone call confirmed his life was over. David did not return to the house that night. It was all too painful. He briefly went to the front door but did not go in. He wanted to grieve alone.

  There had been a steady stream of farewells as the family and friends gathered for his end. Much was forgiven and forgotten. A rota had been organised by Rose Boyt, who had taken the lead. David was always there, an essential presence. ‘He was certainly one of the great loves of Lucian’s life,’ said John Richardson, who had seen and known most of them. David was there from early morning and sometimes through the night, staying in the spare room as Lucian’s final days saw him grow weaker. Towards the end it was David who sat through the night, gently turning Lucian every two hours. It was always evident how much they cared about each other, both being so un-beholden but modestly, quietly, irrevocably linked.

  Their ease and closeness was evident when I photographed Lucian painting him in his studio. They had agreed that I could watch them do together what they did for so many hundreds of hours. David discarded his clothes and sat with the whippet Eli on a mattress, Lucian standing by the easel. A silent drama unfolded, the crucial link between them, united by paint. There was an ease, a familiarity and a sense of comfort. The painting was about an uncovering, a deciphering of love and friendship, of patience, of sitting quietly there, sharing space and time. It was a mutual giving and receiving, an understanding of and by two men connected to each other, and also an appreciation of the slow but extraordinary change that all paintings went through.

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sp; Portrait of the Hound, 2011

  David’s soft-white skin took on a subtle warm tone as light from the garden window shone through the trees outside. It was as much a portrait of Lucian in some ways, his feelings and affection so tangible. I was a silent witness to a magical moment of intimacy and trust, and the connection between the two men was understated but overwhelmingly obvious. Lucian looked, sensed and reacted intuitively, adding a brushstroke, an extra dab of colour. It is in essence a love painting. ‘Lucian couldn’t stop himself. You have these very powerful and sometimes loveless nudes and then you end with this gentle bathing in light of the body by someone who clearly loves him. What a sense of affection. He couldn’t stop himself showing the love in that final painting,’ remarked David Hockney when he went round the National Portrait Gallery exhibition, which ended with three portraits of Dawson. There is indeed a tenderness that is missing from so many of the other raw pictures of naked bodies.

  David had lived through Lucian’s highs and lows for twenty years. Possibly the most alarming moment for David had been when Lucian, aged eighty-six, was photographed with a wild zebra in a film studio in Acton, West London, echoing the zebra motif in his paintings. A film-maker called Tim Meara was making a film about Lucian and as an imaginative gimmick had hired a zebra for the day. It took fright after Lucian tapped it on the nose, and bolted. Lucian clung on to the reins, which he was holding as he was dragged crashing to the floor. ‘He instinctively never let go and so was pulled along,’ recalled Dawson. There was a huge panic, as Lucian was rushed to the Cromwell Hospital for a scan. He suffered only a groin strain, but it was a moment that David had thought might have prematurely ended his life. Kate Moss came round to comfort him and was memorably photographed by David giving Lucian a cuddle in bed.

  The term ‘assistant’ fails to do justice to the intimate and fundamental nature of David Dawson’s role as curator, keeper of the door and guardian of the flame. In the final years David had fixed everything for him, and Lucian saw more of him than any other person. Quiet, intelligent and funny, David also had a steely core which he used to protect Lucian. He was essential to the artist’s life. He was the only named beneficiary in Lucian’s will, and was left the house in Notting Hill and £2.5 million.

  The bulk of Lucian’s wealth – a staggering £96 million – was left to his daughter Rose Boyt and his lawyer Diana Rawstron to act as trustees to carry out his wishes, which were not published but were expected to be of benefit equally to his children through a trust whose contents will remain secret. Just as he had preserved the privacy of most sitters by not naming them, it was typical of him to maintain an anonymity for his children in his last testament.

  There were many farewells. John Richardson flew in from New York and chatted animatedly, showing him a collage of his painting of the Queen cut in half and joined to a photograph of her, both appearing almost identical. Lucian laughed. Jeremy King, his host at the Wolseley for dozens of dinners, told him, ‘Lucian, you do know we love you,’ only to get the reply, ‘Oh I say, don’t go overboard.’ King added: ‘I know it is uncomfortable for you to hear that but you need to know that we love you, that I love you.’ Lucian quietly said thank you. Such sentimentality was not his thing, but it was appreciated. Sally Clarke stood quietly by his bed, and even though she knew Lucian would not completely approve, she said a prayer.

  When Lord Rothschild, friend, sitter and patron, dropped by a few days earlier, Lucian got up, started to get dressed and said to David that they had a meeting and must get ready to go to it. ‘Yes, we have to go to the National Gallery,’ said David. Lucian clearly did not want his bed-bound vulnerability to be exposed. He had always needed to be in control.

  Nicholas Serota had come by some weeks before, partly to help David and Lucian sort out which pictures still in the studio should be culled. They looked through unfinished works, and some, which Lucian felt he did not want left in the studio, were destroyed. These were the works he had abandoned or was no longer working on. It was Lucian’s final act of control over his legacy.

  Celia Paul came, as did Sophie de Stempel, his muse for so many years, and a constant stream of children and grandchildren. The McAdam Freuds, who had rarely seen him over the last twenty years, all turned up. Lucian faced the parade with sweetness and patience.

  The two most important women in his life were there for the last days. Jane Willoughby lay beside him in his quiet, cool bedroom. Theirs had been a love affair that had lasted more than half a century. She had been the most loyal patron, supporter, friend, lover, muse and soul mate.

  David had the delicate task of making sure that Jane did not bump into Susanna Chancellor, who came for her goodbye. David called through from downstairs to Jane who said to Lucian that she had better go as Susanna was coming. ‘Who is Susanna?’ he mischievously asked, the great juggler of hearts right to the end, making all feel that they were the only one. Susanna lay beside the man who had been such a force in her life. Then she flew to her home in Italy to await the final news. He was slipping away fast.

  There were always people opening and closing doors around him; he was at the centre of every entrance and exit. The circus surrounding his life was almost over. Now the children, who had never before been in charge, had control. They would make the decisions about his funeral and memorial service. The man who had avoided a family in any conventional sense had them all around him at the end. Some took umbrage as they were given strict times for visiting, but it was necessary as there were so many, and to avoid a bottleneck of visitors. They all were moved and moving about their father, from the eldest girls, Annie and Annabel, down to Frank, the youngest, who had been walking from Land’s End to John O’Groats when he got a call in Yorkshire and immediately returned.

  ‘My mum had already been to see him about ten days earlier and asked me if I wanted her to come along. I asked Rose if it would be OK and she said fine. It was difficult for Mum because she had had a certain finality and felt a great sense of warmth and wasn’t sure if it was appropriate to go again. A couple of my half-sisters were there and also a nurse.

  ‘We stood around and there was a lot of silence. My sister Rose was very open about the certainty of him being about to die and didn’t mince her words. Not that she was crass, but she didn’t resort to euphemism or the language of false hope. She said the last of the senses to go is your hearing, so we could still say a final goodbye to Dad and he’d be able to hear. She said I should hold his hand and say something to him and she left me alone with him to do that. I did hold his hand, which didn’t respond, but I couldn’t think of anything to say so I was just silent.

  ‘I had never particularly seen him as a father figure, even though he was my father. The adjective that comes to mind when I think of him is “playful”, and that he was very uninhibited about the impression that people would get of him, no matter what the company.’

  His life was always a tangled web, which did not end with his burial. Jacquetta Eliot, the mother of his son Freddy, was told she was not welcome. Yet Freddy did turn up. It was a curtailed affair, with the children restricting it to themselves and his grandchildren. Lucian’s niece, Dorothy (the daughter of Stephen Freud, Lucian’s older and surviving brother) was told it was just for the immediate family. It was the children’s time and theirs alone, after years of playing second fiddle to the women and the work in his life.

  The night after Lucian died, restaurateur Jeremy King ordered a black tablecloth to cover his corner table in the Wolseley, with a single candle burning in his memory. David Gilmour, the guitarist from Pink Floyd, and his wife, the writer Polly Samson, dined there that evening. ‘There was an ecclesiastical hush, tangible sadness around the black tablecloth with a single flickering flame. As when Lucian was living, everyone tried not to stare,’ said Samson. Sophie de Stempel was also there, as were Lady Antonia Fraser, the biographer and widow of Harold Pinter, and Victoria Rothschild, widow of the playwright Simon Gray, and they shared a moment of res
pectful silence.

  Lucian had been born into an era when fields were ploughed by horses, and died during an age when images of his work are stored on microchips. His life was governed by obsessions, selfishly pursued, whether women or his art, never restrained or diverted by what others thought. He broke every rule which did not suit him, and perhaps had no rules at all. ‘How can it be selfish when he only says what he is going to do? There was no narcissism,’ said Jeremy King.

  In trying to understand the complexity that is Lucian Freud, it is necessary to stay focused on his art. The pictures tell who he slept with and spent time with. He mostly kept the names hidden but the paintings don’t lie. Look for the pictures of Anne Dunn peeping through a curtain of brambles, Caroline anguished in bed in Paris, the gay coterie of Peter Watson, Stephen Spender and Cyril Connolly, or even the young boy Charlie Lumley, who Lucian claimed broke into his flat in Delaware Terrace.

  It ended surprisingly with a Christian funeral (although Lucian had told David he just wanted his body thrown in the local canal in a bag – the pull of Paddington always remained strong). Instead, the grandson of the most prominent Jew in Europe had a service in a Christian church overseen by Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury (who is married to Celia Paul’s sister Jane, and is thus an uncle to Lucian’s son Frank). The last time I had seen Lucian in a remotely Christian context was in another Jewish household, the home of Sir Evelyn and Lynn de Rothschild, who had an annual Christmas dinner in Buckinghamshire where carols were sung. Lucian and my wife Kathryn shared a hymn sheet as we belted out ‘Good King Wenceslas’. He knew every word and sang heartily. Wine spilt down the dress of producer and actress Trudie Styler, Sting’s wife. ‘Did you do that on purpose’ I asked Lucian, as he helped her wipe her lap. He laughed. Mischief was always part of his repertoire.