Francis Bacon’s father bred horses, and Francis himself was fascinated by the movement of animals. He studied wildlife books and Eadweard Muybridge’s 19th-century photographic studies of creatuares in motion, feeling that animal behavior—uninhibited, honest—was a clue to the hidden truths of human nature. Bacon drew energy from the beast’s raw expression, and the meat in his paintings often represented his own subconscious desires. Bacon’s father threw him out of the house when he was 16; it was no secret the boy was gay. In an interview conducted by the art critic David Sylvester, Bacon said, “We are meat, we are potential carcasses. If I go to a butcher’s shop, I always think it is surprising that I wasn’t here instead of the animal.” This exhibition, which spans four decades of the artist’s career, focuses on Bacon’s groundbreaking suggestions of queer culture. —Elena Clavarino