{"status":true,"msg":{"data":{"id":47285,"auction_id":95,"set_id":125,"lot_number":"33","artist":"Rodolfo Samonte (b. 1941)","title":"a.) Savannah I b.) Savannah III","starting_price":240000,"signed_dated":"a.) signed and dated 1972 (verso) b.) signed and dated 1972 (verso)","medium":"a.) lacquer and polymer on wood b.) lacquer and polymer on wood","size":"a.) 28\" x 32\" (71 cm x 81 cm) b.) 28\" x 32\" (71 cm x 81 cm)","property":null,"coa":null,"provenance":"The Luz Gallery","exhibited":"The Luz Gallery, Recent Paintings by Rodolfo Samonte, Makati, May 16 - June 6, 1972","literature":null,"write_up":"These four works comprised Rodolfo Samonte’s landmark show exhibition in mid-1972 at The Luz Gallery. The exhibition showcased Samonte’s first foray into large-scale painting, a bold progression from the dimensional stringency of printmaking. Samonte employed lacquer in these works, favoring it for its fast-drying quality since he wanted to see the results of his work immediately.
Samonte started as a prolific printmaker in the late 1960s, mounting his debut solo exhibition in 1969 featuring his colored woodcuts (He had been doing the relief process of woodcuts since his student days at the University of Santo Tomas.). At the 2nd Philippine Association of Printmakers Annual Competition in 1969, Samonte bagged the first, second, and fourth prizes in the relief category. The following year, he also effortlessly snatched the first and third prizes in the same category.
Samonte chose the more unorthodox path of printmaking; it was his stable source of income. He says to Armando Manalo in the May 28, 1972 issue of The Philippine Sunday Express: “If you are not an addict of the high life, you can live fairly well on the sales of prints. Graphics in this country is a young art, and the demand is steady.”
By 1972, Samonte had become attracted to what he calls “the borderline between painting and sculpture.” “I have always been interested in sculpture,” he told Cid Reyes in a correspondence dated August 1978 and published in the latter’s Conversations on Philippine Art. “All my relief works, whether they are prints or paintings, are expressions of my sculptural ideas.” Also, Samonte revealed in the same correspondence that his transition from printmaking to painting was necessitated by the fact that he “was trying to get away from the strict confines of the print medium and its small format”; he wanted that “architectural” atmosphere.
Indeed, the four works at hand all possess that monumental feel, thanks to Samonte’s painted relief style. Created in his visual language of reductionism, Samonte’s geometric abstraction, influenced by Arturo Luz, seemingly evokes Mesopotamian reliefs, the storied hieroglyphics of Ancient Egypt, and even the Hispanic-period hardwood relleves in the Philippines. As a result, Samonte allows himself to let loose, harnessing the transcendent character of both painting and sculpture. Pictorial quality is wedded with rhythmic projection and delicate illusions of depth and texture, thus resulting in works that appeal to the tactile imagination. (Adrian Maranan)","lot_group":"Painting","lot_details_html":"
Rodolfo Samonte (b. 1941) a.) Savannah I signed and dated 1972 (verso) lacquer and polymer on wood 28\" x 32\" (71 cm x 81 cm)
b.) Savannah III signed and dated 1972 (verso) lacquer and polymer on wood 28\" x 32\" (71 cm x 81 cm