Francis Bacon self-portrait to fetch up to €26.5m at auction

A Francis Bacon self-portrait rarely seen in public is expected to fetch up to €26.5m when it goes under the hammer later this year.

Widely acknowledged as the finest self-portrayal Bacon ever produced, Two Studies For A Self-Portrait has been hailed by experts as a "masterpiece".

Bacon is widely regarded as one of the finest British painters of the 20th century and is best known for capturing the tortured psychological depths of human existence in his portraits.

In stark contrast, Two Studies For A Self Portrait, painted in 1970, exudes positivity.

It depicts an elated Bacon on the cusp of his career-defining retrospective at the Grand Palais in 1971 and in the throes of his relationship with George Dyer, whose suicide a year later was to haunt Bacon and shape his art for decades to come.

It is expected to fetch between $22m and $30m (€19.5m to €26.5m) when it is auctioned at Sotheby's Evening Auction of Contemporary Art in New York on May 11.

The piece has remained in the same private collection since soon after it was painted more than 45 years ago and is little known to the public eye, having only been exhibited twice before.

Oliver Barker, senior international specialist in Contemporary Art at Sotheby's, said: "Two Studies For A Self-Portrait goes straight in at number one of all the paintings I've handled in my career.

"Discovering a work such as this is like finding gold dust. To my mind, the painting is worthy of a place alongside the very finest self-portraits of Rembrandt, Van Gogh and Picasso. It's certainly among the greatest self-portraits ever offered at auction."

Sotheby's auction house said the portrait was "the absolute zenith of Francis Bacon's most significant and enduring body of work".