{"status":true,"msg":{"data":{"id":22317,"auction_id":25,"set_id":44,"lot_number":"57","artist":"Mesa Altar in the Baliuag Style","title":null,"starting_price":1600000,"signed_dated":"2nd quarter of the 19th century (1825–50) \nBaliuag, Bulacan","medium":"Golden Narra and Balayong with carabao bone and Kamagong wood inlay and solid silver keyholes ","size":"38 1/2” x 32” x 61” \n(98 cm x 81 cm x 155 cm)","property":null,"coa":null,"provenance":"From the De Leon family, San Miguel de Mayumo, Bulacan \n(before 1933); Mrs Victoria de Leon–Suntay, San Juan del Monte, Rizal (in \n1933); A gentleman collector.","exhibited":null,"literature":null,"write_up":"This Baliuag (“Sheraton”) demilune mesa altar (altar table) is the most bow-fronted example to surface in the antique market thus far. It is also fairly early, possibly from the 1830s. It is an unusual combination of golden narra and dark golden brown balayong wood, whether out of artistry or paucity of materials, it is not known. The pared– down neoclassicism and overall sparse inlay are indicators of early Baliuag furniture pieces. The tabletop is a single, thick piece of golden narra wood applied on its surface with carabao bone and kamagong wood line inlays simulating a horizontal panel. The thick top is extensively molded on all three sides and placed directly on a second, thinner panel, the sides of which are ornamented with a series of diamond–shaped bone inlays punctuated with kamagong dots that run throughout the front and sides of the table. There are three drawers forming the demilune bow-front, all in balayong wood. The drawers are applied with carabao bone and kamagong line inlays simulating horizontal panels. There are solid silver keyholes and drawer pulls. The upper portions of the drawers, reasonably worn where the keyholes are from nearly two centuries of continuous use, have been carefully restored. There are four drawer divisions, also in balayong wood, enhanced with bone and kamagong line inlay simulating small vertical panels. Under the drawers is a cenefa (or molding) of golden narra ornamented with the same series of diamond–shaped inlays punctuated with kamagong dots that run throughout the front and sides of the table. The three front aprons as well as those in the sides are of balayong wood and are festooned at the edges with a series of small rectangular bone inlays that run throughout the front and sides of the table. The four legs are all of balayong wood graced with flower–patterned bone inlay just above the series of small rectangular bone inlays. An interesting and crucial detail is the panel of stylized pennants at the back of the table serving as an apron, also of balayong wood, a feature characteristic of the older “mesa altar”/altar tables in the Baliuag style.
\nThere is an interesting old note stuck to the back of the apron at the rear: “S O P 3. 06.33 Mrs. Victoria Suntay, San Juan del Monte, Rizal” which seems to be a form of identification for the purpose of a residential transfer.
\nThe De Leon family has deep roots in San Miguel de Mayumo town, Bulacan. They are related to the prominent sugar planter de Leon–Joven family of Bacolor, Pampanga and the political de Leon family of Tarlac province. Ceferino de Leon married the beautiful Catalan mestiza Maria Roura and their daughter Trinidad de Leon y Roura became the wife of Manuel Roxas y Acuna, who became President of the Philippines after World War II. Trinidad de Leon–Roxas became the First Lady of the Philippines. Narcisa Buencamino married Jose de Leon aka “Capitan Pepe” and she became the pioneer moviemaker of the Philippines prewar with the LVN Studios which she co–founded with investors Carmen Villonco and Eleuterio Navoa.
\nThe imposing 1890s bahay–na–bato of the aristocratic Ceferino de Leon (onetime Senator of the Republic) and Maria Roura still stands along the main road of San Miguel de Mayumo town. It is an ancestral house with an escalera principal (grand staircase), caida (entrance hall), sala (living room), cuartos (bedrooms), comedor (dining room), cocina (kitchen), and azotea (elevated service area) as well as a separate camarin orstorehouse for the rice harvests. Beautiful antique furniture remain in the house: a pair of Neo–Gothic bookcases, a small grooved marbletop table, a mariposa sofa, various round and rectangular tables, etc. Filipiniana scholar Martin I Tinio Jr gushed that the house once had a room filled with Ceferino de Leon’s European silverware. One of the historic contents of the house is a large glass vase filled with bloodied sand which was immediately gathered by a De Leon gentleman on the very spot where Jose P Rizal --- his friend from school days at the Ateneo Municipal --- was executed in Bagumbayan field in December 1896.
\nThe De Leon–Roura ancestral house was a suitable setting for this very old Baliuag mesa altar (altar table), which would have been placed in the cuarto principal (master bedroom).
\nAuthor’s Note:
A mesa altar or altar table for the sacred Christian – Roman Catholic images of the household was one of the earliest pieces of Filipino furniture. The earliest prototypes from the late 1500s-early 1600s were copies of Ming dynasty tables. Sometime in the 1600s, based on church inventories, these morphed to the massive altar tables with legs decorated with Oriental grotesque masques (adapted from the Asian goddess “Kala”) and ball-and claw feet all on stretchers, colloquially termed dinemonyo (“with a demon”). Still in the Sinitic tradition, a high point of the mesa altar was reached in the mid-1700s with the comoda de Batangas or “Batangas Uno” altar table, (according to Ramon N Villegas and Osmundo Esguerra), a hardwood extravaganza of red tindalo wood and black kamagong wood with three to five drawers, delicate piercework flanges and apron, occasional inlays of kamagong wood and carabao bone, all supported on cabriole legs over stretchers. The ornate Batangas altar table was succeeded by a plain version with cabriole legs on stretchers, some with serpentine drawer fronts, the “Batangas Dos.” The interesting thing is that both the “Batangas Uno” and the “Batangas Dos” types of altar tables were made well into the first half of the 1800s. \nThe Sinitic tradition ended there as copies of Western European – Victorian tables became all the fashion during the second half of the 1800s.
In Baliuag, Bulacan located in the plains of Central Luzon, a furniture-making tradition flourished from around 1800 until after World War II.
\nThe furniture designs were theoretically European neoclassical but in practice American Federal (ironically, the USA, not Spain, was the top trading partner of Filipinas for most of the 1800s), the woods used were golden narra and kamagong, the decorations were carabao bone and kamagong inlays (some very rare pieces were decorated with mother-of-pearl inlay).
\nBaliuag, Bulacan produced this type of neoclassical, bone and kamagong –inlaid mesa altar with a bowfront, three drawers, and four square, tapering Hepplewhite legs during the first half of the 1800s. The general look is reminiscent of an English/ American Sheraton – type sideboard and that was why local antique dealers and agents termed such pieces as “Sheraton.”
\nIn more recent times, “Sheraton” “mesa altar”/altar tables reached their utmost desirability during the 1980s when the Intramuros Administration represented by Jaime Laya, Esperanza Bunag – Gatbonton, and Martin Tinio, and top collectors Paulino Que, Antonio Gutierrez, and Romeo Jorge were at the pinnacle of the collecting game. Advised by leading antique dealers Ramon Villegas, Osmundo Esguerra, Romeo Bauzon, Antonio Martino, Terry Baylosis, Jean-Louis Levi and Willie Versoza, the top collectors rhapsodized over the most beautiful and the rarest examples and admired the latest acquisitions of their peers --- one entirely in tindalo wood with a bowfronted central drawer and flanking concave drawers with magnificent, “Penaranda – style” floral inlay (according to Martin I Tinio, Ex Coll: Maria Tinio Romero-Buencamino estate, Ex Coll: Tinio-Imperial family; presently in the Casa Manila house museum-Intramuros Administration; it has an exact pair, Ex Coll: D M Guevara Foundation- Museo ng Buhay Pilipino, Maria Tinio Romero-Buencamino estate, presently in the Museo De La Salle, DLSU-D De La Salle University- Dasmarinas, Dasmarinas, Cavite); one entirely in kamagong wood with six drawers and six feet and inlaid with carabao bone (according to Ramon N Villegas, presently in the Paulino and Hetty Que collection); one classical example in golden narra wood with six drawers and six feet and inlaid with carabao bone, kamagong wood, and an unusual blue stone (according to Antonio Martino, Ex Coll: Dr Eleuterio M Pascual (“Teyet”) 1986, Antonio Martino (“Tony”) 1984-1986, Antonio Gutierrez (“Tony”) 1984,
\n Governor Macario Arnedo y Sioco-Maria Espiritu y Dungo estate 1912-1984, bgy Capalangan, Apalit, Pampanga; Felipe Buencamino y Sioco-Juana Arnedo estate 1850-1912, bgy Capalangan, Apalit, Pampanga; presently in the Jose Moreno (“Pitoy”) estate, 1987-present).","lot_group":"FURNITURE","lot_details_html":"
Mesa Altar in the Baliuag Style 2nd quarter of the 19th century (1825–50) Baliuag, Bulacan Golden Narra and Balayong with carabao bone and Kamagong wood inlay and solid silver keyholes 38 1/2” x 32” x 61” (98 cm x 81 cm x 155 cm)