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Lot 9

 

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“Renaissance painters painted men and women making them look like angels…I paint for angels, to show them what men and women really look like” (Edwin Mullins, Souza, Anthony Blond, London, 1962, p. 82).

Within his large figurative oeuvre, F.N. Souza’s portraits of the ‘tortured saints’ that he remembered from his grandmother’s stories and early experiences of the Roman Catholic Church in Goa are perhaps the most significant and... “Renaissance painters painted men and women making them look like angels…I paint for angels, to show them what men and women really look like” (Edwin Mullins, Souza, Anthony Blond, London, 1962, p. 82).

Within his large figurative oeuvre, F.N. Souza’s portraits of the ‘tortured saints’ that he remembered from his grandmother’s stories and early experiences of the Roman Catholic Church in Goa are perhaps the most significant and insightful. Portraying religious figures like the Pope, St. Peter and John the Baptist, these pieces not only offer us insight into Souza’s life and personal struggles, but are also an important source of his social and religious commentary. As Geeta Kapur explains, “The recurring portraits of priests, prophets, cardinals, and Popes are…to be taken literally for what they are but also symbolically as representatives of institutions and authority, only more treacherous in that they claim divine sanction…It is this double connotation of fact and symbol and his interlocked feelings of secret fascination and objective disgust which make Souza’s handling of religious figures so unique" (Geeta Kapur, Contemporary Indian Artists, Vikas Publishing House, New Delhi, 1978, p. 20).

In this striking 1955 piece, an irreverent rendering of St. Sebastian, the patron saint of various causes ranging from archers and victims of the plague to bookbinders, Souza juxtaposes the grandeur of his subject’s royal vestments with a blank, mask-like expression. Originally from a wealthy Roman family and an officer of the empire’s barbarous Imperial Army, St. Sebastian’s richly embroidered red and gold jacket speaks of wealth and pageantry. At the same time, his neck and head are pierced by arrows, symbolizing his sacrifice and suffering for the salvation of his fellow men. In this juxtaposition of self-interest and altruism, Souza seems to be suggesting that the celebration of his subject’s martyrdom may not, in actuality, be warranted. According to the artist, “It takes a lot of money to serve the Heavenly Father with vestments on, and an earthly father is needed to take care of it” (F.N. Souza, Nirvana of a Maggot, Encounter, London, Issue 17, February 1955). Souza’s impression of the orthodox, hypocritical and avaricious tradition that St. Sebastian represents is completed in his rendering of the saint’s face. With his barred teeth and vacant stare, this richly robed and widely celebrated icon seems an indifferent gentile rather than a beatific and revered martyr.

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