Museum Catalogue: Lucian Freud’s ‘Girl With a Kitten’

SCAD
Written By Carmela Andreozzi

Born in Germany in 1922, Lucian Freud was one of the most important figurative artists from the 20th century. As the grandson of the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, a lot of his work was psychologically intense. His artworks are raw, emotional, and all deeply personal to him. During his time as an artist, he worked almost always from life including self-portraits, a series of paintings of his mother, and portraits of his lovers.

His work “Girl with a Kitten” is a portrait of Freud’s first wife Kathleen Garman, who was also known as Kitty. The two had a rough relationship that lasted only four years, and their relationship was frequently described as emotionally turbulent. Kitty was the daughter of sculptor Jacob Epstein and often modelled for him. During the time of her marriage with Freud, she was the model for many of his artworks as well.

This 1947 artwork was done with oil on canvas and is rather small in size at around 12 x 16 inches. Although it was originally in the London Gallery, it is now in a private collection. It is no longer able to be viewed by the public, which makes the analysis of it even more important.

Freud posed Kitty with a kitten as a play on her nickname. She has a strong grip on the kitten’s neck, with the whiteness of her knuckles showing how strong of a grip she has. This suggests she is strangling the cat. And with the kitten being a play on her name, one can infer she is strangling herself. This is symbolic and could represent self sabotage or her suffering at her own hand or from the relationship. One source says, “Kitty's straight dark eyebrows are mirrored in the kitten's markings; its pale paws, which look as if they've been dipped in cream, match her pallid fingers,” (Ashby). This creates an even greater link between Kitty and the kitten.

Moving onto the formal details of the work, Freud uses a cool and muted color palette which gives the painting an overall melancholy feel. The lack of depth also contributes to this with the bare, neutral brown background. The subject is also tightly framed and painted on a small scale, suggesting this painting had an intimate, emotional importance to Freud. This also makes her seem isolated, or even trapped within the painting. 

World War II ended two years prior to the creation of this painting, when people were still in a time of high anxiety and dealing with grief. And because there were so many advancements in psychology and understanding the human brain, a lot of artists, such as Freud drew from this as inspiration. Because this was a painting of his wife at the time, this artwork held an even greater significance to him because of his emotional connection to the subject as well as the work itself.

 
Carmela Andreozzi
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