F.N. Souza

F N Souza (Frances Newton Souza) born April 12, 1924, Saligoa, Portuguese Goa [now Goa state, India]—died March 28, 2002, Mumbai, India) was one of India’s best-known contemporary painter whose style was not easily characterised, though it was decidedly modern in outlook. His subjects ranged from still lifes, landscapes, and nudes to Christian themes such as the Crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Souza’s paintings rejected convention and the banality of everyday life, and many of them explored erotic subjects. Francis Newton Souza’s unrestrained and graphic style created thought-provoking and powerful images. His repertoire of subjects covered still life, landscape, nudes and icons of Christianity, rendered boldly in a frenzied distortion of form. Souza’s paintings expressed defiance and impatience with convention and with the banality of everyday life. Souza’s works have reflected the influence of various schools of art: the folk art of his native Goa, the full-blooded paintings of the Renaissance, the religious fervour of the Catholic Church, the landscapes of 18th and 19th century Europe, and the path-breaking paintings of the moderns. A recurrent theme in his works was the conflict in a man-woman relationship, with an emphasis on sexual tension and friction. In his drawings, he used line with economy, while still managing to capture fine detail in his forms. He also used a profusion of crosshatched strokes that made up the overall structure of his subject.