Lot Essay
Ink and gouache on silk, lacquer work and oil on canvas, Franco-Vietnamese painter Le Pho excelled in all these medium. And regardless of the medium he worked in, Le Pho rarely deviated from his singular inspiration as an artist - that of depicting the beauty and romance evoking an inherent grace and ideal of a bygone era.
Le Pho worked between cultures and bore a great sensitivity towards the inherent philosophy of both Oriental and Occidental aesthetics. Lady combing her hair depicts a feminine subject matter on silk, where the inherent refined quality of the material lends an immediate softening and shimmering effect to the subject. Contrary to a Western painting, Oriental portraitures - particularly those of the Chinese to which the Vietnamese modeled after and Le Pho was a more than capable proponent of - emphasized only the fine silhouette of the sitter with no regards to perspective or the effect of lighting and shading. Le Pho's Lady combing her hair is an evocative rendition of beauty imagined and nearly comes to bear the quality of timelessness.
Le Pho worked between cultures and bore a great sensitivity towards the inherent philosophy of both Oriental and Occidental aesthetics. Lady combing her hair depicts a feminine subject matter on silk, where the inherent refined quality of the material lends an immediate softening and shimmering effect to the subject. Contrary to a Western painting, Oriental portraitures - particularly those of the Chinese to which the Vietnamese modeled after and Le Pho was a more than capable proponent of - emphasized only the fine silhouette of the sitter with no regards to perspective or the effect of lighting and shading. Le Pho's Lady combing her hair is an evocative rendition of beauty imagined and nearly comes to bear the quality of timelessness.