"The chaos bubbling just below the surface of our lives drives our desires to succeed and win. That is what I paint."
Lincoln Townley (born 1972, London) is one of Britain's most significant and commercially successful self-taught painters, whose work draws on his years running nightclubs in London's Soho, his recovery from addiction, and his intimate proximity to the world of celebrity. His heavily layered figurative paintings - described by Sotheby's as combining the distortion of Francis Bacon with the sculptural paint application of Frank Auerbach - have achieved remarkable auction results, including $623,000 for his portrait of Muhammad Ali and $378,000 for Dance With The Devil at Sotheby's New York. He has exhibited at the National Gallery, the Royal Academy, the Saatchi Gallery, Somerset House, and the Venice Biennale (2019, 2022), with a fourth Venice Biennale participation planned for 2026. His portraits of Al Pacino, Charlie Sheen, Michael Caine, and Russell Brand are among the most recognised works in his practice.