Christiano CRUZ (1892-1951)

Christiano Alfredo Sheppard Cruz was born in Leiria in 1892. He died in 1951 in the city of Silva Porto, Angola.

An autodidact, press drawings were his sole artistic guide. Backed up by his family’s pro-republican background, Cruz was well-appointed for anti-monarchic satire and social criticism. His breach with satire later on created a rift within caricature. He became a “romancer of the line” and placed his faculties at the service of the idea and created what we now designate “impersonal caricature”. The aim of these drawings was to withdraw from mere political emphasis by using humour as a philosophy, and as such, assail the customs of Portuguese social identity, which were perceived to be narrow-minded, provincial and impoverishing. Cruz felt that his true obligation was to educate people with art. He was entirely aware that the solution to the crisis lay beyond the political sphere; it resided in existential issues, in the way people thought. Within political caricature, Cruz only had any admiration for Rafael Bordalo Pinheiro. He endeavoured to distinguish himself and criticise his mentor’s followers. “Make art instead of criticism!” became one of his great maxims, as well as the battle he waged against old timers.

These presuppositions correspond to his first phase from 1909 to around 1913, considered to be a period of stylisation. Cruz freed himself from his initial excessive ornamentation to develop an almost abstract adumbration. A new code of humour could only be serviced by a new visual code and by the creation of a new, quicker form of perception. Cruz created his ultra-synthetic characters– quite similar to modern-day “cartooning”– according to this logic. He was considered to be a true “sorcerer of irony” and felt that the best way to achieve his objectives was to attack situations instead of people by coherently articulating the titles and captions of his work.
In 1910, Cruz moved to Lisbon were he further studied Veterinary Science. He joined Stuart de Carvalhais, Jorge Barradas, Pacheko, António Soares and Almada Negreiros in co-founding the Sociedade dos Humoristas Portugueses.

During his second phase, which began in 1913, his drawing evolved to become more expressionist and closer to the Austrian style of the period, namely that of Schiele and Kokoschka. He withdrew from the Humorists, although he continued to participate in the Modernist Exhibitions.

During his third phase, Cruz withdrew from caricature and redirected his attention to painting. Senhoras à Mesa de Café (Ladies at the Café Table) from 1919 reveals the worldliness that he criticised as a game of seduction and cruelty. The violent treatment of the canvas, the brutal definition of each figure’s contours and the cynicism that he thus transmits is consonant with the cold colours he applies to the ladies’ garments, which at times contrasts with their ruby lips, granting the observer the illusion of night-life in its entire disguise. The rules of representation become instable, rendered by sharp and oblique angles, like the ones found in the table or elegant cups. Cruz recovers the mythic theme of the eternally cruel female with the refined poses of these women, their cold jewellery, caught in an attitude of conspiracy and intrigue. One of the woman’s hands resembles a pistol, revealing her status– an accomplice in a premeditated crime, a status celebrated through a set of malicious smiles. This painting was one of his last.

In 1916, Cruz joined the army and during the following year, the Portuguese Expeditionary Corps, to fight in the First World War. During this period, and until the Armistice in 1918, which marked his return to Portugal, Cruz created a series of sketches narrating war scenes with the instantaneous spontaneity of a correspondent.

In 1919, Cruz began another phase, leaving Portugal for Lourenço Marques, Mozambique, to practise veterinary medicine, thus initiating his retreat from the art world. By relinquishing his career as an artist, Cruz revealed a certain modern awareness, a nihilistic disenchantment, which was to become a part of his myth.

CARLA MENDES