This painting by F N Souza is a rare work that does not distort the human figure. The subject, a veiled woman, bears a striking resemblance to other portraits of his partner at the time of painting, Liselotte Kristian. It holds an unusual place in his oeuvre as a portrait of a woman that does not otherwise render her a conduit for the depravity of the human race. Souza produced many such portraits of Lisolette that betray a certain tenderness... This painting by F N Souza is a rare work that does not distort the human figure. The subject, a veiled woman, bears a striking resemblance to other portraits of his partner at the time of painting, Liselotte Kristian. It holds an unusual place in his oeuvre as a portrait of a woman that does not otherwise render her a conduit for the depravity of the human race. Souza produced many such portraits of Lisolette that betray a certain tenderness largely absent from his other works.

Liselotte Kristian was born in 1919 in Prague, Czechoslovakia, from where she escaped to England to escape Nazi persecution of the Jewish people. A scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) led to a successful career on stage and screen. She starred in the popular 1950 war movie Odette alongside acclaimed actors Anna Neagle and Trevor Howard. Kristian was active in the intellectual community of London and would host meetings for the social reform organisation Progressive League. Souza was immediately lovestruck on meeting her in December 1954. She soon reciprocated and they embarked on a long partnership. By all accounts Souza was enamoured with Liselotte and their love was anchored by their intellectual fellowship. Their dynamic proved highly generative for Souza; the duration of their relationship overlaps with one of his most fruitful creative periods during which he also made lot 13. In 1959, the same year that Souza painted this lot, he credited Liselotte in the dedication for his book Words & Lines with, “My thanks… to the two L’s, the one who gave me life, that is birth, the other who gives me love, that is bed and not bad which makes much of the stuff in this book. And of course there’s God to thank for who first makes Life possible and then impossible.” (The artist quoted in F N Souza, Words & Lines, London: Villiers, 1959)

Souza uses thick layers of paint to create rich texture using powerful uniform strokes. Despite the face being the point of interest on the canvas, the image is amply differentiated from Souza’s infamous heads by the figure being cut far below the neck, with the precise detailing of her garment and hands imparting a confident individuality. A curiously gentle work for Souza, the woman is not only recognisably human but pleasantly so. Her serene smile stands in contrast to the harsh lines, malformed faces, bared teeth and shocking scars on his heads.

The figure is bounded by thick black lines which draw equally from Expressionism, Spanish Romanesque art and classical Indian sculpture. Souza’s impressive draughtsmanship has been remarked upon by critics like John Berger and it is the strength of his line that upholds his compositions. The artist explains, “Drawing is the armature, the anatomy, the structure. I see drawing as solid even when I easily draw in pure outline. It’s good to remember Euclid: a point has no length or breadth but has a position. A line is made up of a number of points. A number of lines make a plane. A number of planes make a solid… Drawing for me is essential in order to build up the structure of my iconography. Drawing is a system from which colours hang.” (The artist quoted in Aziz Kurtha, Francis Newton Souza: Bridging Western and Indian Modern Art, Ahmedabad: Mapin Publishing, 2006, p. 98)

The dark hooded attire kindles Marian associations. Celebrated as the mother of God in the Catholic tradition, Mary is a fitting equivalence for Liselotte who bore three children to Souza and whom he has lovingly rendered in another work to recall Madonna and Child. The profound impact of Souza’s visit to the Catalonian Museum in Barcelona which introduced him to the splendour of Romanesque frescoes is evident in the religious imagery and close?cropped spatial composition. The frontal positioning raises the figure to an iconicity shared with saints and martyrs. It is a startlingly straightforward treatment of the sacred: “the entire pageant of saints and martyrs of the Goan churches” that Souza employs elsewhere to lampoon the rapaciousness of the powerful is used to deify a mate who is both lover and collaborator. (“Francis Newton Souza: Devil in the Flesh”, Geeta Kapur, Contemporary Indian Artists, New Delhi: Vikas Publishing House Pvt Ltd, 1978, p. 18)

Read More
Artist Profile
Other works of this artist in: this auction  |  entire site