Bacon was born in Ireland but moved to London when he was 16. Shortly thereafter he visited Paris and Berlin. Retuning to London in 1929 he worked as a furniture designer and began drawing and working in water-colours but never had formal art school training. Before long he started painting in oils. exhibited a few paintings as well as furniture and rugs in his studio. His work was included in a group exhibition in London at the Mayor Gallery in 1933. In 1934, the artist organized his own first solo show at Sunderland House, London, which he called Transition Gallery for the occasion. He participated in a group show at Thomas Agnew and Sons, London in 1937. He painted relatively little after his solo show in 1934 and in the 1930's and early 1940's destroyed many of his works. He began to paint intensively again in 1944. dramatic and riveting work gained international recognition and acclaim. His first major show took place at the Hanover Gallery, London, in 1949. His first solo exhibition outside England was held in 1953 at Durlacher Brothers, New York. His first retrospective was held at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, 1955.
In 1962, the Tate Gallery, London, organized a Bacon retrospective, a modified version of which traveled to Mannheim, Turin, Zurich, and Amsterdam.
Other important exhibitions of his work were held at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, in 1963 and the Grand Palais in Paris in 1971; paintings from 1968 to 1974 were exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1975. Retrospectives of his work were held at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles Country Museum of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 1989-1990 and at the Musee National d'Art Moderne, Paris, in 1996. He artist died April 28, 1992, in Madrid.