PROPERTY FROM THE TARCILA LAPERAL MENDOZA COLLECTION

Accompanied by a certificate issued by Mrs. Sylvia Amorsolo-Lazo confirming the authenticity of this lot

Provenance: Acquired directly from the artist

ABOUT THE WORK

The famous dowager Doña Tarsila Laperal Mendoza was a hundred years old when her beloved Laperal Mansion would be returned to the family in a landmark Supreme Court decision. It is described as one of the most beautiful homes in Manila. The house on Arlegui Street is in the San Miguel district made famous as the address of the rulers of the Philippines — from its Spanish and American governor-generals to the presidents of the republic. It had an equally eminent past, beginning as ‘Blair House’, the residence of an American general of that name, then the German chancellery in the 1930s. It would next be inhabited by the speaker of the National Assembly established by the Japanese during the war years. It would at one time even be occupied by the National Library. In 1975, however, the property was sequestered by the government and would be converted into a VIP guest house as well as presidential offices at various times. Doña Tarsila was the eldest daughter of Roberto Flores Laperal and Victorina David Guison, both of Sta. Cruz, Manila. Victorina’s father was a prominent jeweler in the Spanish regime and was said to have trained his daughter even as a tot in the art of his profession. The newly married couple would found the Victorina G. de Laperal Jewelry Store on Avenida Rizal (today’s Rizal Avenue) in 1913. By the end of the 1930s, it would become reputedly one the biggest establishments in the city. The Laperals would then acquire the Arlegui property in this period along with many other assets of land and buildings. Among the worldly goods the Laperals acquired were these two Amorsolo paintings, both painted in 1921 by the Maestro. This year, they now mark another important 100-year milestone. Fernando Amorsolo would chart serendipitously a parallel path to the Laperal fortunes. In 1909, he would enter the School of Fine Arts at the University of the Philippines where his famous uncle and mentor, Fabian de la Rosa, was a professor. He would be one of the first six men to graduate from the then 5-year course in 1914, about the same time as the Laperals were celebrating their first year as jewelry-store proprietors. A few years later, Don Enrique Zobel de Ayala would sponsor Amorsolo’s studies at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid. Told that there was nothing more that he could learn from his professors, he returned to Manila in 1920. Amorsolo would reprise his uncle’s prize-winning work “Planting Rice” in 1921 and in so doing, would find a theme that would make him in his time even more famous than De la Rosa. The dappled rice fields and golden sunrises of the Philippine countryside would among his most beloved. It would be his lasting legacy. He would paint tirelessly for Commonwealth textbooks and calendars; as well as murals for the Metropolitan Theater and artworks for the Manila Carnival. Like the Laperals, he would become increasingly influential and a force to reckon with. In the work entitled A Terraced Farmland, Amorsolo captures every Filipino’s dream : Land he could call his own, enough to feed his family and send his children to school, a place to put a roof over his head and make his home. Green fields are central to this artwork; the farmer works the plough with his carabao while his wife and child tend the vegetable patch outlined by a bamboo trellis. The thatch roof of their house can be glimpsed among banana fronds. Fruit trees circle this little paradise.