Important Notice

The year 1956, when the present lot was executed, was a seminal one for F N Souza, following his successful artistic and literary debut in London the previous year. His first solo show at Gallery One had won him critical acclaim, as had his first publication, the semi-autobiographical essay, “Nirvana of a Maggot”. Riding the crest of this wave of critical and commercial successes, Souza’s paintings and drawings of the mid and late 1950s comprise... The year 1956, when the present lot was executed, was a seminal one for F N Souza, following his successful artistic and literary debut in London the previous year. His first solo show at Gallery One had won him critical acclaim, as had his first publication, the semi-autobiographical essay, “Nirvana of a Maggot”. Riding the crest of this wave of critical and commercial successes, Souza’s paintings and drawings of the mid and late 1950s comprise some of his best works.

His series of ‘Heads’ from the 1950s are probably his most important and well-known figurative works. In addition to exploring the nuances of figuration, these portraits served as channels for the artist’s scathing social commentary and frequently centred on the dual issues of sex and religion, pleasure and suffering, which absorbed him all through his career. Offering insight into his personal life as well as his beliefs, they unmasked the hypocrisy of the clergy and the gentry, exposing their ‘soullessness’ for all to see.

The post-war climate of London saw artists like Francis Bacon using their art to reflect upon the brutal reality of a society that was still reverberating from the war. Souza, who was often likened to Bacon by critics and was himself reeling from the political atmosphere of a newly independent India, experienced a similar disillusionment in London when he painted the present lot in 1956. Souza’s subjects during this time were the savagely distorted heads of the everyman, with soulless eyes disp-laced to the forehead, a set of gnashing teeth bared, and the face “a ridged, rocky terrain bounded by lines and petrified by its own violence.” (Yashodhara Dalmia, “A Passion for the Human Figure,” The Making of Modern Indian Art: The Progressives, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001, p. 83)

The present lot shows Souza’s typical thick and frenzied brushwork which serves as a demonstration of his unmistakably harsh commentary on humanity and its decadence. “It was a damning denouement of an affluent society that had a cankerous serpent at its core. For Souza’s piercing vision had seen the embittered, hardened man who had emerged from this society and had represented him bared of all disguises. These were works without redemption.” (Yashodhara Dalmia, Souza in London, New Delhi: British Council, 2004, p. 10)

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