ABOUT THE WORK

Known for his highly charged works as warm with various symbols, Dexter Sy explores an evidently religious theme in “Thou Shall Suffer”. Characterized by a hierarchic scale, the painting positions a Christ-like figure in the center of the canvas, notable for a crown of flaming halo. Around him are various images of the mortal world (Christ, after all, is the God who became human), evoking temptation, suffering, and death. The work is, at once, apocalyptic and apocryphal, as if the work itself is a pictorial language that, if decoded, will narrate the Passion of Christ.