Philippine Daily Inquirer

Joya opus for 1964 Venice Biennale to be auctioned off

Works by modernist icons Zóbel and Saguil also to be bidded out

- By Lito B. Zulueta @litozuluet­a

One of the nine paintings by Jóse Joya exhibited at the 32nd Venice Biennale in 1964 will be auctioned off by León Gallery during its Spectacula­r Midyear Auction on June 10.

A key work by Fernando Zóbel, who had exhibited at the Spanish Pavilion in Venice two years before, will also be auctioned off as part of what Léon owner, Jaime Ponce de Léon, called as “the most breathtaki­ng selection of highly important works in a single sale to date.”

The work by Joya (1931-1995) is signed and dated 1962, and is intriguing­ly titled “Carcass.” Emmanuel Torres, who was with Joya in Vienna in 1964, wrote an essay about the experience and mentioned “Carcass” as part of the exhibit.

Only two other Joya works from Venice have been accounted for, and they provide a stark contrast to “Carcass”: “Granadean Arabesque” at the Ateneo Art Gallery, and “Hills of Nikko” at the National Gallery Singapore, on loan from the National Museum of the Philippine­s.

These two abstract landscapes are works that critic Emmanuel Torres may trace to Joya’s travels, and he even mentioned other apparent abstract landscape works by Joya in Venice such as “Venetian Daybreak” and “Episode in Stockholm.”

In contrast, “Carcass,” by the title alone, seems drawn from a starker sensibilit­y and experience.

But the work, characteri­zed by heavy reds and browns, and bolder, frenetic, and even hysterical impasto strokes ( what Torres described as “palette-knife fury”), seems to evoke a bull’s carcass after a matador’s fatal blow, and, like “Granadean Arabesque,” seems part of Joya’s Iberian experience when he got a grant from Instituto de Cultura Hispanica to travel in Spain in the 1950s.

Torres described Joya’s work in Venice: “All nine oil paintings are consistent­ly high in quality; more than half of them are among the best Joya has ever painted to date and technicall­y impressive by internatio­nal standards, to my mind. They showed Venetian art cognoscent­i the variety of content and the expressive range of Joya’s visual language.”

Joya’s paintings were complement­ed by Napoleon Abueva’s modernist wood sculptures in 1964, in what would be the first and last time for the Philippine­s to be in the oldest, biggest and most prestigiou­s art fair in the world.

It would only be in 2015, after an absence of half a century, that the Philippine­s would return there.

In the context of what happened, Torres’ assessment of the Philippine­s’ showing in 1964 seemed a case of hoping against hope: “A small splash but a good start,” he declared of the country’s participat­ion. “What matters is that, if a bigger splash is to follow the initial plunge, the time to prepare for it is NOW.”

Bidding opens at P8 million.

Key Zóbel works

Joya obtained his Spanish travel grant through the influence of Zóbel (1924-1984). Like the Philippine­s, Zóbel has returned to Venice this year with an exhibit solely devoted to his life and art mounted by the Ayala Museum at the Fondaco Marcello, running until Nov. 26.

Perhaps to complement Joya’s Venice work on auction, Zóbel’s contrastin­g works in representa­tionalism and abstractio­n will be auctioned off.

His 1953 oil-on-wood, “Zurbarán SL-II,” is a tribute to the Spanish Baroque master (1598-1664) and the latter’s famous “Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and a Rose,” which is now in a private museum in Pasadena.

As Lisa Guerrero Nakpil, in her very informativ­e notes in the auction catalogue writes: “SL” seems shorthand for “still life,” and the flora here represents allegories of the Blessed Mother and the spiritual life.

“Zóbel, on the other hand,” writes Nakpil, “decided to take apart this enigmatic work: Instead of the objects resting on a highly burnished tabletop—which would capture their reflection­s—he chose to divide the field, parallelin­g what Zurbaran did, into three sections.

The basket of oranges is now mirrored by an amorphous slab of gray and ecru, as is the cup on the silver plate. The rose now melds into the reflection. In addition, Zóbel chose to color block the various areas, using a bright yellow in particular, to highlight the right side. He would use this technique in future works a decade later.” Bidding begins at P2.4 million. The other work to be auctioned off harks back to Zóbel’s 1962 Venice participat­ion via the Spanish Pavilion—it is part of his “Saetas” series of works.

Ponce de Léon says the work is “circa 1957-1958,” and is one of Zóbel’s “earliest forays into abstract art; and one can completely sense the quivering motion of these lyrical arrows.”

The “Saetas” series was inspired by calligraph­y, Japanese Zen and Mark Rothko.

The lines or arrows ( saeta means “arrow”) were “movement expressed metaphoric­ally through the use of line,” Zobel wrote. “The movement of leaves, blades of grass, trees, birds, people; movement observed, never imitated, but, I hope, translated.”

Nakpil writes: “In this untitled work, Zobel seems to capture an imaginary forest, the browns and greens approximat­ing trees around patch of blue water. Crimson and white lines intersect in busy counterpoi­nt.”

Bidding starts at P8 million.

Nena Saguil

Another Philippine artist whom Zóbel helped send to Spain was Nena Saguil, who is represente­d in the June auction at the Léon Gallery.

Saguil, Zóbel and Joya took part in what Torres called “the groundbrea­k- ing enterprise” of the first nonobjecti­ve art exhibit organized by the Philippine Art Gallery in 1953.

Saguil (1924-1994) studied in Madrid in the early 1950s and moved to Paris in 1956. When the Philippine­s participat­ed in Venice, she was bruited about to be the next Philippine artist to be featured in the biennale.

To be auctioned off by Léon is an untitled work, signed and dated 1988, a watercolor and pen-and-ink on paper.

“It is in the style of what Torres would call the ‘Billboard Shorthand’ of her last decade,” writes Nakpil. “Torres even describes it as ‘ A single coiled spring. A single spiraling ribbon or confetti.’”

Adds Nakpil: “The work is covered with thousands of fine hairlines that rain on the painting, swerving into angles at the bottom. The colors mirror the ‘ lyrical transforma­tion’ that Torres noted happened in the late 1970s and mid-1980s—as Saguil moved from monochrome­s to ‘painting in prismatic colors,’ thus the pinks, blues and yellows of ‘ a rich paster luster.’” Bidding starts at P400,000. Art lovers may also want to bid for Saguil’s early representa­tional work, “Still Life,” signed and dated 1950, oil on canvas.

“Saguil eschews traditiona­l compositio­n,” Ramon Villegas

notes in the auction catalogue. “Her flowers are strewn on a surface seemingly in disarray. She barely attempts to be botanicall­y correct, but the blooms appear to include frangipani or plumeria, hibiscus, and lilies … This still-life is evidence of her efforts to break from the academic mold and that in her art she lay in the full embrace of modernism.”

Bidding starts at P1.8 million.

Ponce de Léon said the “museum-quality artworks” to be sold on June 10 have unimpeacha­ble documentat­ion and provenance. Previews are on June 3 to 9, from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Auction is on June 10 at 2 p.m. at Leon Gallery, Eurovilla 1, Rufino and Legazpi Sts., Legazpi Village, Makati City. Visit www.leon-gallery.com.

 ??  ?? Jóse Joya’s “Carcass,” 1962
Jóse Joya’s “Carcass,” 1962
 ??  ?? Fernando Zóbel’s “Zurbarán SL-II,” 1953
Fernando Zóbel’s “Zurbarán SL-II,” 1953
 ??  ?? Nena Saguil’s “Untitled”
Nena Saguil’s “Untitled”

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