{"status":true,"msg":{"data":{"id":45983,"auction_id":93,"set_id":122,"lot_number":"19","artist":"José Joya (1931 - 1995)","title":"Morning Mist, Hangchow","starting_price":12000000,"signed_dated":"signed and dated 1973 (lower right and verso)","medium":"oil on wood panel","size":"48\" x 64\" (122 cm x 163 cm)","property":"PROPERTY OF A VERY DISTINGUISHED FAMILY","coa":"Accompanied by a certificate issued by Mr. Alexander Richard Joya Baldovino confirming the authenticity of this lot","provenance":"The Luz Gallery","exhibited":null,"literature":"Kalaw-Ledesma, Purita and Amadis Ma. Guerrero. The Struggle for Philippine Art. Manila: Purita Kalaw-Ledesma, 1974. Captured in a black-and-white photograph (page 132) at the opening night of Joya's 1973 exhibition at The Luz Gallery titled \"Joya: New Paintings.\"","write_up":"Joya and His Rediscovery of the\nFilipino Sensibility<br><br>\nBut Joya’s venture into geometric expressionism aligns more with\na Filipino sensibility. While Pop Art’s seriality critiques mass\nproduction, consumerism, and media saturation, Joya’s geometric\nabstraction was influenced by an intimate reconnection with the cultures\nof his motherland. In 1967, when Joya had just settled in New York for his\nscholarship, he became engrossed with the study of Philippine history—\nprobably a sign of part homesickness, part curiosity, and part reawakening\nin him.<br><br>\n\"At this time, the study of Philippine history engaged me,” Joya says in\nLeonidas Benesa’s Joya: Drawings. “Digging into rare sources, I came across\nmaterials that gave light facets to Philippine history.\" Furthermore, this\nreinvigorated spirit in Joya coincided with the resurgence of nationalistic\nand progressive ideals during the tumultuous 60s (also the era of the wars\nof national liberation against imperialism in many nations like Cuba,\nVietnam, and the Philippines), in which the search for a pre-colonial\npast became intertwined with the concept of nation-building and the\ndecolonization of Philippine history. Joya’s interest also coincided with\nthe rise of nationalist historiography fostered by the eminent Teodoro\nAgoncillo and Renato Constantino. Said Joya in Benesa’s book, \"Artists\nrespond to interests prevailing during their times.\"<br><br>\nJoya had even envisioned a design center at the UP campus laden with\nindigenous designs. As Dean, he also espoused the idea that “art has a\nbig role to play in these troubled times, and the artist must realize that\nhe, too, has a social commitment.” “Before they get a diploma from the\nstate university,” Joya says in the Panorama interview, “I will require\nthem to serve the communities in terms of sharing the things that they\nhave learned in school. This country can be a leading producer in local\nhandicrafts, and our artists can certainly improve the design.” (Philippine\nPanorama, 3 January 1971)<br><br>\nIconography inspired by old coins, anting-anting, and pre-colonial articles,\nsuch as pottery shards and metal fragments excavated in archaeological\nsites, e.g., Santa Ana, Manila in the late 1960s (in which nationalist\nanthropologist F. Landa Jocano formed part of the archaeological team),\nwas Joya’s first answer to an increasing nationalistic impulse in his art. The\nshapes—which Joya says are “rich in visual vocabulary” and would later\ntransform into the recognizable block-like forms in the early 1970s, evident\nin Morning Mist, Hangchow—and their seriality evokes the dynamic\nrhythm of repetition and progression found in Philippine indigenous art,\nparticularly in weaving, embroidery, and ornamentation.<br><br>\nNotice in Morning Mist, Hangchow the incised markings evoking\nvarious old Philippine alphabets, “almost as if they were cryptic Malayan\nsymbols,” as Joya puts it in Cid Reyes’ ‘Conversations on Philippine Art.’\n“I have always thought that we Filipinos suffer from too much Western\ninfluences. It is good for us to start rediscovering our past.” In doing so,\nJoya transforms the entire composition into that of a meditative space, an\navenue to reclaim our past and redefine the present. Joya had liberated his\nart from the Western influences of the Abstract Expressionist school and\nhad now identified himself and his art with the collective cultural psyche\nof his native motherland.<br><br>\nJoya’s incorporation of indigenous elements, thus emphasizing his Filipino\nsensibility, proved to be the pinnacle of artistic maturation for the\nartist. Joya’s renewed interest in Philippine culture and history birthed\nhis newfound creative expression. His integration and consolidation of\nvarious indigenous elements not only underscores the virtuoso of Joya but\nmore so, a heightened understanding of the collective cultural—harmony\nin solidarity, as evoked by his contiguous forms. As Francia Jr. writes,\n“[Joya] takes us out of the temporal sphere or plane into the purer and\neternal one.”<br><br>\nDespite the foreign subject matter, Morning Mist, Hangchow is a sublime\narticulation of a Filipino visual language that would reach a high point in\nhis monumental 1976 painting “Pagdiriwang” (PICC Collection), which\nJoya said is “the celebration of the Filipino’s struggle to discover himself\nand assert his own position in the universal society of men…a tribute to\nthe Filipino’s pride in his own identity.” (Adrian Maranan)","lot_group":"PAINTING","lot_details_html":null,"alias":null,"hp":18000000,"bp":0.2016,"isWithdrawn":0,"accounting_hp":18000000,"userBid":5926,"isPaid":0,"userId":22,"lot_status":"SOLD","isDone":1,"bid_history_id":null,"reserve_price":null,"hammer_price":21628800,"fav":0},"image":[{"id":45536,"img_url":"https://leongallery.sgp1.digitaloceanspaces.com/v2/auction/93/122/lot/19.jpg","isFeatured":1}]},"increment":[11000000,12000000,13000000,14000000,15000000,16000000,17000000,18000000,19000000,20000000],"prev":18,"next":20,"count_bid":0,"bid_history":[],"tokenExpired":1}