.jpg?w=1)
拍品專文
In 1937 Le Pho returned from Vietnam to settle permanently in Paris. This would be a pivotal decision for him not just as an artist but would prove to have a great impact on his personal life.
Settlement in France would mean that the artist was spared of the disruptive turbulent years back in Vietnam which would impede the painting careers of many his contemporaries who stayed back in Vietnam. Paris also exposed the artist to a matured European art market and he was represented by a few galleries both in Europe and in the United States, most notably the Wally Findlay galleries.
The works of Le Pho could be broadly divided into 2 main categories, firstly the very popular impressionist style of pastoral scenes usually endowed with the beautiful Vietnamese beauties and the very fine, calligraphic work done on silk, a genre which most critics see it as a blend of East and West techniques and aesthetics. It is widely asserted that the early silk works (1920s to 40s) are the rarer works of the artist and most representational of the artist's training and tendency.
The present work is a fine example of Le Pho's early work. Rendered on silk and using fine paint brush with ink and colour, the work depicts the sitter in a kneeling position surrounded by potted flowers. The oriental feel of the work is suggested with the calligraphic outlining of his sitters and objects with an elegance and sublime quality that are reminiscent of Chinese silk painting. Therein lies the intention of the artist, to hint, and to suggest of an Oriental aesthetics at first glance by an onlooker.
A closer examination, however, reveals the formal Western training of the artist: the sitter is placed in the center embellished by the surrounding flowers and remains the sole subject of veneration, a perennial characteristic of classical Western portraiture and the composition structured and balanced with a perspective in place. Le Pho illustrates the quintessential elements of his 'Oriental' silk work superbly with the present lot: a hint of the Oriental qualities with the calligraphic lines as well as the diffusing of ink on the surface. Nevertheless, the work remains in essence, a Western work, which is preoccupied with the perfect pictorial balance of a composition.
The same formula is applied on another work of the artist. Titled Hrmonie verte: Les deux soeurs, (Christie's Singapore, 28 March 1999, lot 152), the work evokes a similar feel of a soft, romantic Oriental aesthetics but the execution is accordance with classical Western techniques.
It definitely reveals a close link with the works of the Renaissance master Lernardo da Vinci, as Le Pho incorporated the atmospheric perspective of Mona Lisa in which the contours of the backgrond landscape lost their sharpness and volume to not only achieve a sense of space and distance but also to create a mystic and romantic mood that blends harmoniously with the refined and sensitive lines of Oriental silk painting.
Le Pho adopts this style of fusion throughout his career though he used it less regularly in the later years.
Settlement in France would mean that the artist was spared of the disruptive turbulent years back in Vietnam which would impede the painting careers of many his contemporaries who stayed back in Vietnam. Paris also exposed the artist to a matured European art market and he was represented by a few galleries both in Europe and in the United States, most notably the Wally Findlay galleries.
The works of Le Pho could be broadly divided into 2 main categories, firstly the very popular impressionist style of pastoral scenes usually endowed with the beautiful Vietnamese beauties and the very fine, calligraphic work done on silk, a genre which most critics see it as a blend of East and West techniques and aesthetics. It is widely asserted that the early silk works (1920s to 40s) are the rarer works of the artist and most representational of the artist's training and tendency.
The present work is a fine example of Le Pho's early work. Rendered on silk and using fine paint brush with ink and colour, the work depicts the sitter in a kneeling position surrounded by potted flowers. The oriental feel of the work is suggested with the calligraphic outlining of his sitters and objects with an elegance and sublime quality that are reminiscent of Chinese silk painting. Therein lies the intention of the artist, to hint, and to suggest of an Oriental aesthetics at first glance by an onlooker.
A closer examination, however, reveals the formal Western training of the artist: the sitter is placed in the center embellished by the surrounding flowers and remains the sole subject of veneration, a perennial characteristic of classical Western portraiture and the composition structured and balanced with a perspective in place. Le Pho illustrates the quintessential elements of his 'Oriental' silk work superbly with the present lot: a hint of the Oriental qualities with the calligraphic lines as well as the diffusing of ink on the surface. Nevertheless, the work remains in essence, a Western work, which is preoccupied with the perfect pictorial balance of a composition.
The same formula is applied on another work of the artist. Titled Hrmonie verte: Les deux soeurs, (Christie's Singapore, 28 March 1999, lot 152), the work evokes a similar feel of a soft, romantic Oriental aesthetics but the execution is accordance with classical Western techniques.
It definitely reveals a close link with the works of the Renaissance master Lernardo da Vinci, as Le Pho incorporated the atmospheric perspective of Mona Lisa in which the contours of the backgrond landscape lost their sharpness and volume to not only achieve a sense of space and distance but also to create a mystic and romantic mood that blends harmoniously with the refined and sensitive lines of Oriental silk painting.
Le Pho adopts this style of fusion throughout his career though he used it less regularly in the later years.