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Lot Essay
Hendra Gunawan is recognised as one of the leading first generation modern artists in Indonesian art, alongside S. Sudjojono and Affandi. His works celebrate the daily lives of men, women and children in Indonesia. For Hendra, life begins with the existence of a community, and a consistent theme running through his paintings is of people at work, at play, performing rituals, in celebrations and occasionally in grief or suffering.
In 1935, he became one of the Kelompok Lima (Group of Five) artists in Bandung, West Java, where he al so set up the Pusaka Sundan (Sundanese Heritage) organization. Hendra was a member of the Sanggar Pelukis Rakyat (People's Artists' Studio) in Yogyakarta, Central Java. This eventually led to his involvement in the communist sponsored Lembaga Kebudayaan Rakyat (Lekra, People's Culture Association), and he was imprisoned in the aftermath of the abortive Indonesian communist coup in 1965. Hendra later was released in 1978 upon which he embarked on a new phase in his art marked by the use of a brighter, fresher colour palette.
Christie's presents a quality selection of works of Hendra Gunawan this season. Ayah Bermain dengan Anak (Father Playing with his Children) (Lot 1250) is a work that celebrates parenthood, showing a family in the foreground of a beach landscape that is typically Hendra, not only in the subject and composition, but also in the layered impasto technique that Gunawan has chosen to render his subjects.
Wanita Menyusui Anak (Woman Nursing a Child) (Lot 1249) is a heart-warming rendition of the classic pictorial theme of mother and child. Completed in 1978, the year that Hendra was released from prison in Bandung, the abundant ripe fruits and overflowing voluptuousness of the female figures in the painting suggest that nurturing a child will eventually bear fruits of labour. Set against a richly coloured background of the beach and the sea - two leitmotifs in Hendra's paintings symbolizing the expanse of imagination and hope - the work recalls a particularly humanistic thread in Hendra Gunawan's oeuvre.
Bathing by the River (Lot 1256) shows an exquisitely affectionate bathing scene where a mother figure is flanked by two girls, in a vertical composition that is emphasises by pictorial elements such as the mother's falling hair, her towel dipped in the water and the cascading arrangement of the girls and figures in the upper right section of the painting.
Hendra oftentimes also paid paean to womenfolk and their labour too. Women In an Idyllic Landscape (Lot 1257) depicts womenfolk sifting rice in an idyllic mountain plateau. The colouration and composition of the mountains in the background illustrates the eye that Hendra possessed for simple natural beauty of the landscape and its people.
In 1935, he became one of the Kelompok Lima (Group of Five) artists in Bandung, West Java, where he al so set up the Pusaka Sundan (Sundanese Heritage) organization. Hendra was a member of the Sanggar Pelukis Rakyat (People's Artists' Studio) in Yogyakarta, Central Java. This eventually led to his involvement in the communist sponsored Lembaga Kebudayaan Rakyat (Lekra, People's Culture Association), and he was imprisoned in the aftermath of the abortive Indonesian communist coup in 1965. Hendra later was released in 1978 upon which he embarked on a new phase in his art marked by the use of a brighter, fresher colour palette.
Christie's presents a quality selection of works of Hendra Gunawan this season. Ayah Bermain dengan Anak (Father Playing with his Children) (Lot 1250) is a work that celebrates parenthood, showing a family in the foreground of a beach landscape that is typically Hendra, not only in the subject and composition, but also in the layered impasto technique that Gunawan has chosen to render his subjects.
Wanita Menyusui Anak (Woman Nursing a Child) (Lot 1249) is a heart-warming rendition of the classic pictorial theme of mother and child. Completed in 1978, the year that Hendra was released from prison in Bandung, the abundant ripe fruits and overflowing voluptuousness of the female figures in the painting suggest that nurturing a child will eventually bear fruits of labour. Set against a richly coloured background of the beach and the sea - two leitmotifs in Hendra's paintings symbolizing the expanse of imagination and hope - the work recalls a particularly humanistic thread in Hendra Gunawan's oeuvre.
Bathing by the River (Lot 1256) shows an exquisitely affectionate bathing scene where a mother figure is flanked by two girls, in a vertical composition that is emphasises by pictorial elements such as the mother's falling hair, her towel dipped in the water and the cascading arrangement of the girls and figures in the upper right section of the painting.
Hendra oftentimes also paid paean to womenfolk and their labour too. Women In an Idyllic Landscape (Lot 1257) depicts womenfolk sifting rice in an idyllic mountain plateau. The colouration and composition of the mountains in the background illustrates the eye that Hendra possessed for simple natural beauty of the landscape and its people.