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Sue Tilley

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Sue Tilley (born 1957), also known as Big Sue, is a British artist's model and writer. She modelled for painter Lucian Freud.

Born in south London,[1] Tilley worked for performance artist and club promoter Leigh Bowery as a cashier at his "Taboo" night club. Bowery introduced her to Lucian Freud in 1990 and she began posing for him the following year. During this time, she was also a full-time benefits supervisor at the Charing Cross jobcentre, a state-operated employment agency, and she eventually became manager there.[2]

Freud painted several large nude portraits of Tilley, the first being Evening in the Studio [de] (1993).[3] Benefits Supervisor Sleeping, painted in 1995, was sold at auction in 2008[4] for £17 million ($33.6 million US) in New York City.[5] In 2015, the 1994 painting Benefits Supervisor Resting[6] sold for £35 million ($56 million US).[7] A fourth painting Sleeping by the Lion Carpet was painted in 1996.[8] Freud also produced a number of etchings featuring Tilley, including Woman with an Arm Tattoo which Tilley sold in 2005.[9]

In 1997, she published Leigh Bowery: The life and times of an Icon, a biography.[10]

From September 2000 to March 2001, Chief Curator Rolf Lauter at Museum für Moderne Kunst Frankfurt could realise the only overview exhibition of Freud's works in a German museum in close cooperation with the artist. Both the catalog and the invitation as well as the poster included Freud's painting Sleeping by the Lion Carpet[11] from 1995/96 with Sue Tilley.

In 2015, she had a solo show of paintings and drawings in a London gallery. She did a collaboration with Fendi to decorate luxury clothes and bags with her pictures of desk lamps, bottle openers, banana skins, cups of coffee.[12]

In September 2021 Tilley was a guest on the BBC Radio 4 show Saturday Live.[13]

References

  1. ^ "Leigh Bowery: The Life And Times Of An Icon By Sue Tilley Now Available As An Ebook From Open Road Integrated Media".
  2. ^ "The ballad of Big Sue". the Guardian. 30 June 2005.
  3. ^ "Evening in the Studio, 1993 - Lucian Freud - WikiArt.org". www.wikiart.org. Retrieved 2 February 2020.
  4. ^ "Lucian Freud portrait of naked benefits supervisor set to sell for £17m". the Guardian. 12 April 2008.
  5. ^ "Roman Abramovich 'revealed as Freud and Bacon buyer'". www.telegraph.co.uk.
  6. ^ "Lucian Freud | Benefits Supervisor Resting (1994) | Artsy". www.artsy.net. Retrieved 2 February 2020.
  7. ^ Laux, Cameron (14 May 2018). "Lucian Freud and Sue Tilley: The story of an unlikely muse". BBC.
  8. ^ Glover, Michael (29 July 2011). "Great Works: Sleeping by the Lion Carpet 1995-6 (228.6cm x 121.3cm), Lucian Freud". The Independent. Archived from the original on 25 May 2022. Retrieved 4 March 2020.
  9. ^ "Freud tattoo model etching sold". 28 June 2005 – via news.bbc.co.uk.
  10. ^ "Leigh Bowery: A life less ordinary". The Independent. 22 October 2011. Archived from the original on 25 May 2022.
  11. ^ Lauter, Rolf (ed.). "Lucian Freud: Naked Portraits. Works from the 1940s to the 1990s, Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main 2000/2001". www.worldcat.org. Retrieved 6 March 2020.
  12. ^ Laux, Cameron. "Lucian Freud and Sue Tilley: The story of an unlikely muse". www.bbc.com. Retrieved 29 December 2019.
  13. ^ "BBC Radio 4 - Saturday Live, Paul Merson".
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