{"status":true,"msg":{"data":{"id":1899,"auction_id":4,"set_id":5,"lot_number":"168","artist":"Félix Resurrección Hidalgo (1855 - 1913)","title":"Boceto, El Desaliento (Study, Hopelessness)","starting_price":600000,"signed_dated":"c. 1888","medium":"charcoal on paper","size":"9 1/4\" x 14 3/4\" (23 cm x 36 cm)","property":null,"coa":null,"provenance":"Inherited from the Artist by his mother, Doña Maria Barbara Padilla y Flores; and from thence to her daughter Pilar Hidalgo, married to Don Maximo Paz; and from thence by direct descent.","exhibited":null,"literature":"The final work, El Desaliento, dated 1888, is in the collection of the National Museum of the Philippines. This work is featured in Alfredo Roces, Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo & The Generation of 1872, Published by the Eugenio Lopez Foundation, Inc., 1995, Full Color Illustration and description as El Desaliento, page 233.","write_up":"When Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo painted the achingly \nbeautiful El Desaliento (or Hopelessness) in 1888, he \nwas at the peak of his artistry, and had just received \nsuccessive accolades from the Madrid Expositions of 1884 and \n1887.
\nIt was thus both interestingly and ironically titled; for biographer \nE. Arsenio Manuel would describe this period “as the most \nproductive in the artistic career of Resurrección Hidalgo.” \nHe explains further, “In 1884, his large canvas Las Virgenes \nCristianas Expuestas al Populacho was presented for exhibition \nin the Exposicion General de Bellas Artes in honor of the Spanish \nKing Alfonso XII in Madrid. Although by this time he must have \nrealized the effect of light upon his colors, the result was still a \nclassic piece. This was awarded a silver medal. It was in the same \nexhibition that the Spoliarium of Juan Luna (q.v.) was shown \nand awarded first prize and a gold medal. To commemorate \nthe event, the Filipino colony in that city tendered a fraternal \nbanquet and rousing welcome to the two honored artists at Café \nIngles on June 25th. Rizal, who was one of the celebrants, was \nin a position to give the merits of Las Virgenes and interpret its \nsignificance.”
\nRizal’s words still ring true today for the same artistic feelings \nto be found in El Desaliento: “In the painting of Hidalgo throbs \nthe purest of sentiment, an idealized expression of melancholy, \nof beauty and weakness … and that is because Hidalgo was \nborn under the brilliant azure of that sky, with the lullaby of \nthe breezes of her seas, amidst the placidness of her lakes, the \npoetry of her valleys and the majestic harmony of her mountain \nranges... Hidalgo is all light, color, harmony, feeling, limpidness \nlike the Philippines in her calm moonlit nights, in her serene days \nwith her horizons inviting contemplation...\"
\n\nIn the Exposicion General de las Islas Filipinas held in Madrid in \n1887, Resurrección Hidalgo presented two paintings: La Barca \nde Aqueronte and La Laguna Estigia.
\n“The first canvas, which has attracted world-wide attention ever \nsince, catches a dreadful scene of Canto III in Dante's \"Infierno where Charon is conducting the condemned to the sinister boat,” \nwrote Arsenio Manuel.
\nHe continued his praise with, “Charon the demon with eyes of \ncoal; Beckoning, garners them together there; Beats with his oar \neach backward-hanging soul. This piece merited a gold medal. \nTogether with a portrait of Madame Boustead, it was again \nshown in 1889 in the Exposition Universelle of Paris.”\nArsenio Manuel notes that La Barca de Aqueronte “was shown \nat the behest of friends and admirers, for Resurrección Hidalgo \nwas congenitally shy and modest.” This insight to his character \nreveals the fragile, gentle emotional state that would have \ncreated El Desaliento.
\nIn the finely wrought boceto (study), two details are absent from \nthe final work : A crescent moon hangs delicately low in the \nsky — showing Resurreccion Hidalgo’s original intent to create \na background of a brooding night sky. (In the completed oil \npainting, it is a cloudy, pale daylit one.) There is also the distant \nfigure of a man, moving away. It is not clear if his head is turned \ntowards the nymph seated on the hillside, or if he has turned \naway. The swift charcoal strokes add more intense emotion to \nthe work : the enchanting woman sits with her face cupped in her \nhand, overcome in deep thought, despite the wooded splendor \naround her.
\nAugusto “Toto” M.R. Gonzalez III has noted that “Felix \nResurección Hidalgo would die unexpectedly in 1913, leaving a \nfortune in real estate, shares of stocks, and paintings without \nlegitimate descendants nor recognized natural heirs; his mother \nDoña Maria Barbara Padilla y Flores, would inherit it all. The next \nyear, however, she passed, leaving the Hidalgo-Padilla fortune to \nher heirs. The bulk of the paintings then went to the “sobrinos” \nof Felix, namely Don Felipe Hidalgo, son of Jose; Don Eduardo \nHidalgo Paz and Doña Rosario Paz de Perez, children of his sister \nPilar who was married to Don Maximo Paz.
\nThe work has been in one family’s continuous possession will \nfinally cede for 110 years, or from 1913 to 2023.","lot_group":"PAINTING","lot_details_html":null,"alias":null,"hp":900000,"bp":0.2016,"isWithdrawn":0,"accounting_hp":900000,"userBid":5926,"isPaid":0,"userId":22,"lot_status":"SOLD","isDone":1,"bid_history_id":null,"reserve_price":null,"hammer_price":1081440,"fav":0},"image":[{"id":1927,"img_url":"https://leongallery.sgp1.digitaloceanspaces.com/v2/auction/4/5/lot/168.jpg","isFeatured":1}]},"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":167,"next":169,"count_bid":0,"bid_history":[],"tokenExpired":1}