{"status":true,"msg":{"data":{"id":158,"auction_id":1,"set_id":1,"lot_number":"120","artist":"Ang Kiukok (1931 - 2005)","title":"Crucifixion","starting_price":1800000,"signed_dated":"signed and dated 1991 (lower right)","medium":"oil on canvas","size":"36” x 12” (91 cm x 30 cm)","property":null,"coa":"Accompanied by a certificate issued by Finale Art File\nconfirming the authenticity of this lot","provenance":"Finale Art File, Makati City","exhibited":null,"literature":null,"write_up":"Religious iconography has figured prominently in Ang Kiukok’s oeuvre. However, Ang’s depiction of famous religious scenes, especially those of Christ’s passion and death, explicitly puts at the forefront the profane rather than the sacred.<br /><br />In this work aptly titled Crucifixion, Kiukok depicts the Santo Cristo Moribundo or the “Dead Christ.” The Arma Christi, or the instruments of passion—the cross, the nails, and the crown of thorns, figure prominently and, at first glance, represent afflictions and tribulations, the instruments of oppression and torture. But in actuality, Kiukok presents his compelling commentary on humanity’s inhumanity to their own fellow.<br /><br />In his own words, published in Alfredo Roces’ monograph titled Kiukok: Deconstructing Despair, Kiukok once said: “The Crucifixion symbolizes suffering. What I express is suffering. But things in the world are still the same. Nothing has changed. Christ suffered, and the people still behave in the same way. Today, as I have painted His image, He is reduced to bones, but people remain the same. Christ suffered for us, but for what?”<br /><br />Kiukok jabs at our religious hypocrisy. Particularly here in the Philippines, where Catholicism is the predominant religion, it seems we cannot ‘walk the talk.’ We may regularly hear Mass, say our prayers, or receive sacraments. But it is in our failure to realize the true essence of our Christianity and neglect of the importance of our shared humanity that Kiukok criticizes.<br /><br />Esperanza Bunag-Gatbonton writes in her book Kiukok that the figure of Christ, “whether as archetypal victim or redeemer, is the most powerful and best-developed.” Kiukok’s ability to translate and contextualize the sacred into the profane brings out the compelling quality of his interpretation of Christ’s passion. Here, Christ is stripped of his divine attributes. The hallowed and idealized artistic depictions of Christ as the Redeemer of humanity are retracted. He is as much a human as every one of us, emphasized more by Kiukok’s deliberate intention not to show Christ’s tormented face to imbibe to the viewer the virtue of finding empathy in our shared humanity in the image of the Divine. Christ’s body is fragmented into geometric planes, exuding a sense of heightened emotional impact and implying the condition of the human spirit being broken from our own iniquity and hypocrisy, our overt indifference to the suffering of our own kind even at the hands of oppressors.<br /><br />A decade after this work, Ang Kiukok was bestowed the venerable title of National Artist for the Visual Arts. (Adrian Maranan)","lot_group":"PAINTING","lot_details_html":null,"alias":null,"hp":2400000,"bp":0.2016,"isWithdrawn":0,"accounting_hp":2400000,"userBid":5930,"isPaid":0,"userId":22,"lot_status":"SOLD","isDone":1,"bid_history_id":null,"reserve_price":null,"hammer_price":2883840,"fav":0},"image":[{"id":131,"img_url":"https://leongallery.sgp1.digitaloceanspaces.com/v2/auction/1/1/lot/120.jpg","isFeatured":1}]},"increment":[2200000,2400000,2600000,2800000,3000000,3200000,3400000,3600000,3800000,4000000,4200000,4400000,4600000,4800000,5000000,5500000,6000000,6500000,7000000,7500000,8000000,8500000,9000000,9500000,10000000,11000000,12000000,13000000,14000000,15000000,16000000,17000000,18000000,19000000,20000000],"prev":119,"next":121,"count_bid":0,"bid_history":[],"tokenExpired":1}