{"status":true,"msg":{"data":{"id":61729,"auction_id":209,"set_id":242,"lot_number":"153","artist":"Osmundo Esguerra Bargueño / Vargueño","title":"cabinet on stand","starting_price":300000,"signed_dated":"20th century","medium":"Kamagong wood (“Diospyros discolor”/“Diospyros blancoi”) <br>\nTortoiseshell, Ivory","size":"H: 52 1/2\" (133 cm) <br>\nL: 39 1/4\" (100 cm) <br>\nW: 38\" (97 cm)","property":"PROPERTY FROM THE DR. JUAN ANTONIO DE GUZMAN COLLECTION","coa":null,"provenance":"Acquired directly from Osmundo Esguerra","exhibited":null,"literature":null,"write_up":"Osmundo \"Omeng\" Esguerra <br> Manila’s Romancer of Wood <br> by AUGUSTO MARCELINO REYES GONZALEZ III <br><br> Omeng came from Guimba, Nueva Ecija and worked for the patrician collector Antonio Tuason (Tony) of the legendary Manila clan in his sprawling Santa Mesa residence. He was exposed to very good art and antiques and Tony Tuason generously tutored him on their qualities. He became an entrepreneur. Omeng realized that he could make good money dealing with the old furniture and objects with which he had become familiar through the years. On a dare from Filipiniana scholar/ jeweler/antique dealer Ramon N. Villegas, he opened the “Osmundo” shop at the Manila Garden Hotel in Makati (now the Dusit Thani Hotel). Once there, he attracted a rich clientele, including the famed Zobel de Ayala family and the extremely affluent Paulino Que of the hardware and Hong Kong real estate empire. <br><br> Omeng struck up a close friendship and unofficial partnership with the respected scholar Ramon Villegas and they proceeded to forge new roads and ideals in the Manila art and antiques world. Both became incredibly successful. Omeng learned the art of exquisite Chinese wood finishes from antique dealer friends in Hong Kong; he became a good friend and collaborator of leading antique dealers Martin Fung, Alan Fung, and Gerald Godfrey and Charlotte Horstmann. And as the cliché goes, the rest was history. <br><br> During his lifetime, Omeng only had to look at and feel a piece of wood in order to know its species and approximate age. Omeng often took the patina/maturity, density, thickness, and the large dimensions of the wood (apart from construction, of course) as indicators of great age and authenticity. <br><br> This elegant, Spanish–style “bargueno”/“vargueno” cabinet rests on a “pie de puente” trestle table stand mainly of kamagong wood (“Diospyros ferrea”/“Diospyros discolor”/“Diospyros blancoi”). The front panel drops to display a luxurious interior of drawers and compartments: four on top, a central compartment, two each on both sides, and three at the bottom. Every drawer and compartment is painstakingly veneered with tortoiseshell, provided a drawer pull of ivory, and edged in ivory line inlay. The central compartment has ivory inlay of the sun and four double–headed Habsburg eagles at the corners. The drawer surrounds are painted with red cinnabar lacquer (natural mercury sulfide). The trestle table stand with substantial baroque solomonic and neoclassical reeded posts is of beautifully turned, lustrous kamagong. <br><br> Apart from the Philippine kamagong wood and the Oriental combination of ivory inlay/marquetry, tortoiseshell veneers, and red cinnabar lacquer, what marks this piece as truly a work of art are the “dinemonyo” grotesque faces at the terminals of the lopers/sliders which support the writing surface of the dropfront desk. <br><br> The Spanish bargueno/vargueno is a portable cabinet and writing desk on either a “taquillon” commode or cupboard, or a “pie de puente” trestle table stand. However made of precious materials, they were designed for travel, for constant transfers; they usually had large handles on the sides for that purpose; they were not made to sit still in a room for decades. The dropfront reveals an architectural arrangement of drawers for documents and secret compartments for valuables; the interiors are usually decorated with luxurious materials: natural polychromes, gold leaf, ivory, bone, madreperla (mother of–pearl), tortoiseshell, unusual shells, rare minerals, rare woods, in miniature architectural details. The bargueno/ vargueno first appeared in Renaissance Spain --- most likely in academic Salamanca, royal Toledo, or aristocratic Valladolid --- during the late 15th century/late 1400s. They were made expressly for royalty and aristocracy. They traveled extensively throughout the Spanish empire during the Golden Age.","lot_group":"FURNITURE","lot_details_html":null,"alias":null,"hp":1000000,"bp":0.2016,"isWithdrawn":0,"accounting_hp":1000000,"userBid":34,"isPaid":0,"userId":34,"lot_status":"SOLD","isDone":1,"bid_history_id":25611,"reserve_price":0,"hammer_price":1201600,"fav":0},"image":[{"id":68623,"img_url":"https://leongallery.sgp1.digitaloceanspaces.com/v2/auction/209/242/lot/153.jpg","isFeatured":1},{"id":68725,"img_url":"https://leongallery.sgp1.digitaloceanspaces.com/v2/auction/209/242/lot/153a.JPG","isFeatured":0},{"id":68724,"img_url":"https://leongallery.sgp1.digitaloceanspaces.com/v2/auction/209/242/lot/153b.JPG","isFeatured":0},{"id":68723,"img_url":"https://leongallery.sgp1.digitaloceanspaces.com/v2/auction/209/242/lot/153c.JPG","isFeatured":0}]},"increment":[900000,1000000,1100000,1200000,1300000,1400000,1500000,1600000,1700000,1800000,1900000,2000000,2200000,2400000,2600000,2800000,3000000,3200000,3400000,3600000,3800000,4000000,4200000,4400000,4600000,4800000,5000000,5500000,6000000,6500000,7000000,7500000,8000000,8500000,9000000,9500000,10000000,11000000,12000000,13000000,14000000,15000000,16000000,17000000,18000000,19000000,20000000],"prev":152,"next":154,"count_bid":0,"bid_history":[],"tokenExpired":1}