The Irish-born artist Francis Bacon (1909–1992) painted 28 known[1] triptychs between 1944 and 1986.[2] He began to work in the format in the mid-1940s with a number of smaller formats before graduating in 1962 to large examples. He followed the larger style for 30 years, although he painted a number of smaller triptychs of friend's heads, and after the death of his former lover George Dyer in 1971, the three Black Triptychs.