Provenance: Manila Workshop of Isabelo and Vidal Tampinco

ABOUT THE WORK

Isabelo Tampinco y Lacandola, acknowledged to be one of the most outstanding sculptors of his time, garnered many awards and prizes in local and international exhibitions in Philadelphia, St. Louis, Madrid and Barcelona. He was principally known as a laborista, a carver of ornament, because of the doors, altars, ceilings and other decorations he made for the Manila Cathedral and the churches of Sto. Domingo and San Ignacio in Intramuros. However, he also did decorative carvings for private homes, like transoms, picture frames and even furniture. Later, he made statues of saints and angels in wood, plaster of Paris, concrete and marble. At the turn-of-the-20th century, when Art Noveau became fashionable, he created a uniquely Filipino style by incorporating native flora and fauna designs in his calado or pierced transoms. His sinuous openwork and whiplash outlines in woodcarving abounded with the anahaw, areca palm, gabi or taro leaves and bamboo. It came to a point that any frame or piece of furniture decorated with these was instantly labeled as “made by Tampinco”. This narra settee and a pair of armchairs with caned seats and backs are of the Carlos Trece type that has always been popular in Philippine homes. How the style came to be called thus is a mystery, as there was no Spanish king of that name. There was, however, a Carlos Tercero, Charles III, under whose reign this type of furniture flourished. This particular set differs from the run-o-the-mill Carlos Trece in its height and bulk which endows it with an air of grandeur worthy of a mansion or even a palace, (The Tampinco father and son, in fact, made a lot of furniture for Malacanang Palace.) The armchairs stand on four delicate cabriole-type legs, two in front and two behind, joined together by an X-stretcher. The settee, on the other hand, has four legs in front and the same behind. The legs, actually slimmed down and attenuated Flemish foot, consists of a volute behind the shoulder that forms a graceful scrollto end with an upturned scroll terminating with an acanthus leaf. The stretchers, in the form of S-scrolls with concave sides, have a turned finial decorating their junction. Connecting the legs in front and at the sides are pierced aprons carved with graceful foliate scrolls on either side of an inverted squash-like flower. The bow-fronted seat frame is edged in front and at the sides with a prominent gadroon border. The seats of the armchairs are caned. Upright and graceful S-scroll carved with an acanthus leaf in front support S-scrolled arms with acanthus-decorated volutes turning inward in front and diminishing in size to form a small volute at the back. The back stiles, slim turned balusters carved with reeds and surmounted by an acanthus bud, support a crest rail profusely carved with a pierced design of symmetrical foliate scrolls. An elaborately turned finials tops each back stile. The high backs of the chairs have narrow caned backrests with rounded tops and bottoms, their bottom rails and splats crisply carved with symmetrical pierced foliar scrolls. -Martin I. Tinio, Jr.