Osian's Auction Catalogue Indian Modern Contemporary Fine Arts | October 2018

73 Indian Modern Contemporary Fine Arts F. N. Souza b. 12 April 1924 – d. 28 March 2002 A Boy Oil on masonite board, 1953 23.3 x 13.6 in (59.2 x 34.5 cm) S/d ‘Souza 53’ t.l. Label ‘Mr. A. Niyogi, I.A.S. Deputy Director-General, Shipping, Fort, Bombay, With all Good Wishes for a Merry Christmas and the Coming New Year from Francis Newton Souza, 23rd December, 1954’ on verso ` 2,000,000 – 3,000,000 $ 27,780 – 41,670 Provenance Gifted by artist Francis Newton Souza to art collector & I.A.S. Officer Amitabha Niyogi on 23rd December 1954 as a Christmas gift (See the illustrated original label ), who would later became Chief Secretary to the Government of West Bengal. Thereafter by descent to his son Ranjan Niyogi. 26 Label on verso To retrieve again and again the memory of certain moments dormant at the back of my mind is an itching pleasure. When I was a boy I never asked my mother where I came from. I had presumed my origin more or less correctly and from then on I began to presume a lot more. I’ve always had a curious feeling of an ancient guilt that I had inadvertently killed my father because he died so suddenly soon after my birth. My mother was like the mother Oedipus; Spartan in shape. She was temperamentally unpredictable and very sophisticated. I used to watch her bathe herself through a hole I had bored in the door. I was afraid if she thrust something in, I might get a bleeding eye-ball. F.N. Souza , in Words & Lines. London: Villiers 1959; p25 Detailed Artist Biography osianama.com/artists/f-n-souza