Auctioning Rizal, Amorsolo et al

Before our participation in the Silliman University National Writers Workshop last month, I had already heard of the loss of what used to be our favorite lodging place in Dumaguete whenever we spent a week there in May. 

By “we” I mean with my distinguished poet-buddy Jimmy Abad, when we used to bring our families with us and booked rooms at South Sea Resort, then the only seaside place in our adopted city. It had a fine garden and a swimming pool that the kids enjoyed, and a couple of restos that served excellent dishes.

That was in the 1990s, and during much of the first decade of the new millennium. Increasingly, however, we began to complain of how the fried daing na bangus for breakfast became smaller and smaller. It certainly was part of the reason that we tired of and gave up on our traditional summer place — that and its relative inaccessibility from the center of town.

So we started trying out other lodging places, until we finally settled, these past several years, on Florentina Homes, still not walkable from the university, but which also had a pool and many other charms.

In any case, we eventually heard that South Sea was no more. The story was unclear. It seems the extension of the coastal road that the city government had pushed for caught up with the property. Someone else said it had been bought up by new investors.

In Dumaguete a couple of weeks ago, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that the new owner was local boy Jaime Ponce de Leon. Common friends call him “Popong” over there.

It’s been a series of coincidences of late. Also last May, I heard the sad news that our Bedan buddy Delfin Amorsolo’s older half-sister, Lina, had passed away at 85 in Washington, DC. Condolences were sent through our e-mail loop to Delfin, who resides in Carlsbad, California.

Soon after, on the penultimate day of May, writer-editor-painter Alfredo “Ding” Roces in Sydney reminded everyone that it was Fernando Amorsolo’s 124th birth anniversary. So we relayed the “Felicidades, Don Fernando” greetings to the great man’s son Delfin. We were also reminded that it was Ding Roces who put together the first coffee-table book on our premier Filipino painter, simply titled Amorsolo (Filipinas Foundation, 1975).

Maybe that was why Sylvia Amorsolo (herself a painter, and who serves as the authenticator of her father’s works) had a son contact me last month, requesting for a meeting soon. Last year she and her brother Delfin were already talking about putting out a new book on their dad.

Now all these seemed to go more than half-circle when Popong of Dumaguete got in touch to invite us to yet another auction he’s mounted, scheduled at 2 p.m. this Saturday, on the eve of Independence Day, at his Leon Galleries in Eurovilla 1, Rufino corner Legazpi Sts. in Makati.

I was more curious to ask about what he intended to do with what he acquired of the former South Sea property. He said that even with that coastal road now in front of it, separating it from the sea, he still had plans to rehabilitate the place and “make it nice again, so you can come and visit.”

Now that’s good to hear. But also interesting was the info that at least ten Amorsolo artworks would be included in what Jaime Ponce de Leon bills as the “Spectacular Mid-Year Auction 2016: The Grand Independence Day Sale.”

Grand it is indeed. Among Fernando Amorsolo’s works, all authenticated by his daughter Sylvia, are a series of five oil paintings commemorating historically significant events, namely: “El Encuentro de Oro Por Salcedo,” “Manalastas Luchando Contra Extranjeros,” “La Construccion de Intramuros,” “Musicos Nativos” and “Clave de Kalantiao.”

“Novaliches / Landscape” from the J. Antonio Araneta Collection; “Portrait of A Wealthy Lady from Marinduque” from the Tony and Tina Turalba Collection; a 1930 pen and ink on paper, “Plowing in a field”; a 1943 oil on canvas titled “Portrait of Chona at 21” (of the young Chona Recto Ysmael); and a 1956 oil, “Winnowing Rice,” make up the rest of the Amorsolos, with starting bids ranging from P60,000 (for the pen and ink) to P1.8 million. These are modest figures, especially for the paintings, that are sure to balloon to as much as seven digits by the time the gavel is banged. 

Then there’s an artwork by national hero Dr. Jose Rizal with a starting bid of P3.8 million. “Jabali (Wild Boar)” — signed and inscribed “Dapitan, 1894” — in plaster, is typical of the small animal sculptures of the hero’s time, except that he chose to use plaster instead of bronze. The material allowed Rizal as “animalier” to capture rough or sinuous animal forms, and to realize intricacies and delicacy of detail.

For this piece along, the auction could be creating history, as it is believed to be the first time that an artwork of our national hero, one of indubitable provenance, is being made available in the auction market. 

Among other outstanding classical works being offered are Felix Resureccion Hidalgo’s “Chateau d’If” — a gift to his dear friend, Don Mauro Prieto; and Fabian de la Rosa’s “Bordadora (The Embroiderer)” — sanguine pencil on board, circa 1920s.

Then there’s a rare selection, a 30” x 23” oil on canvas titled “Dalagang Bukid” — by Pablo Amorsolo, Don Fernando’s brother, known for his technical prowess in classical painting, but who became a 1945 casualty of the war.

Also rare and sure to raise competition for its acquisition would be National Artist Carlos “Botong” Francisco’s “Untitled” work depicting the fiesta of Angono — at a starting bid of P5M.

Another work by a National Artist, Benedicto Cabrera, will also have collectors salivating. At a starting bid of P8M, BenCab’s tribute to famous dancer Isadora Duncan, “Isadora in Motion,” is described as “a 1998 masterpiece of exemplary dimensions and intensity.” It’s a large, overwhelming BenCab, at 96” x 78.”

Many other name artists will be represented, among them Hernando R. Ocampo, Alfonso Ossorio, Macario Vitalis, Jose Blanco, Nena Saguil, Ang Kiukok, Anita Magsaysay-Ho, Cesar Legaspi, Alfonso Ossorio, Fernando Zobel, Arturo Luz, Jose Joya, Lao Lianben, Federico Aguilar Alcuaz, Ofelia Gelvezon-Tequi, Mauro Malang Santos, Onib Olmedo, Augusto Albor, and Justin Nuyda — whose luminous nudes, pastel on paper, I would compete for had I the wherewithal.

And I’d do the same for recently departed Eduardo Castrillo’s “The Power of Grace,” signed and dated 1979, from the Ingrid Sala-Santamaria Collection — a brass sculpture showing four ballerinas with their arms raised with curvilinear grace.

Of the relatively younger artists, I’d favor the works of Ronald Ventura (of course!), Emmanuel Garibay, Soler Santos, Dominic Rubio, Andres Barrioquinto, Rodel Tapaya and Marina Cruz.

But I’d like to make special mention of Maria Taniguchi of Dumaguete, daughter of our good friend Kitty Taniguchi, and who at 35 is fast making a name for herself, right on her mother’s footsteps. Then, also beyond the interest of filial relations, there’s Liv Romualdez Vinluan, daughter of my cousin Nestor Vinluan, who’s also fast tracking her dad’s success in art. At 29, she could be the youngest artist represented in this auction, by her 2007 oil on canvas diptych, “Dog house / Doll House” — at 48” x 96” and a starting bid of P300,000.

I admire my niece Liv’s paintings because they always tell a story, and are also rife with allusions, with “compositions rooted deeply in allegory.” The same may be said of one of my favorite “literary” painters, Marcel Antonio, whose 2000 work “Song of Desire” (also a diptych) and “The Minotaur’s Muse” are both being made available.

Our common friend, the poet and critic V.I.S. de Veyra, yet another Dumaguete workshop alumnus, has described Marcel’s art as “blue funk erotica” and also as “trance erotica.” I agree. I get out of a blue funk and go into trance whenever I view Marcel Antonio’s embrace of “the melancholic or otherwise vexed expression, a subtle sort of fetish erotica that relies on the drama of melancholia instead of on pure eroticism as secret springboards.”

No secret to the success of this artist, as with all others who should mark milestone figures at the auction. Here’s hoping for all that, albeit with all the creative talent to be placed on display, prayers and wishes are of no order. Let Rizal and Amorsolo lead the way to a grand independence from the demands of the mundane.