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Francis Newton Souza (b.1924
d.2002) View Selected Works: |
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Often, he would experiment with a particular theme--a head, a nude figure, a couple engaged in sexual activity--until he had exhausted his ideas with it for the time being and a new subject flamed his imagination. Consequently there is simultaneously a uniqueness to the rendering of each newly created image and a familiarity with its subject matter. What his drawings unequivocally reveal is that Souza was a master of line and contour, that he knew how to draw the human figure and other forms quite accurately. If he painted like the devil he could draw like an angel, although neither extreme is accurate. His paintings are iconoclastic but not satanic. His drawings are masterful but not divine. A curator at the Tate Gallery in London said recently, after seeing a sampling of the estate's work: "Souza didn't learn anything at art school," meaning he was a natural and art school had nothing to teach him; and this is true. Especially when one sees the early drawings of his student days where he was still practicing his craft. It is clear that later abstractions of the figure or landscape were always a conscious choice to move away from merely representating of what the eye sees photographically. [For an account of Souza's first exhibition following his expulsion from the Sir J.J. School of Art in 1947, Click here.] This small selection of drawings has been chosen mainly from work created either with ink or pencil or pastel or charcoal, or a mixture of these materials. A simple distinction between different types of work on paper has been made so that viewers who are new to Souza and his work may get a sense of the breadth and variety of his oeuvre, especially if they also view the Works on Paper and Chemicals sections. By separating the work on paper into different categories, as much as his paintings, Souza's extensive paper renderings confirm his life as one of the great image makers of the 20th Century. Back to thumbnails. |