Jerry Hall met Lucian Freud at a dinner in 1997 when she was eight months pregnant with her fourth child. He asked if he could paint her portrait, and she started posing the next day, three times/week, until she went into labor.

[From Eight Months Gone, Jerry Hall By Lucian Freud – Daddy Types]

I found myself wondering why this was such a big deal – £600,000 isn’t actually that much for a Lucian Freud, let alone one of a celebrity – but then I found out the size, 4x6in – a postcard size oil painting sketch. considering the size of Benefits Supervisor Sleeping and the price it set, this is consistent, even quite high.

I haven’t been following the sale of Jerry Hall’s art collection, but I wonder, along with the quoted author above, what else may have come out of all those sessions. this looks like a wet on wet sketch and probably quite fast. I wonder if there are any others lurking around. this sketch, even with it’s looseness show’s Freud’s wonderful treatment of skintones, gravity and luminosity.