Leon Gallery wishes to thank Mrs. Sylvia Amorsolo-Lazo for confirming the authenticity of this lot.

ABOUT THE WORK

For all the quietude of Amorsolo’s temperament, his pictures sing with painterly wit, and exhilaration. Unobtrusive textures, crisp forms and arbitrary color freshen his imagery. This enables Amorsolo to exploit the full spectrum of glowing colors in his chosen palette — from palest rose through coral and oranges, to darker shadow blues of the distant mountain — as well as the play of light and shadows…and the illuminated waves of the jewel green sea that holds everything together. Amorsolo’s burning vermilion clouds provide the luminous backdrop for a group of fishermen disembarking their catch on a narrow spit of the beach in the foreground. Amorsolo painted fishermen who worked outdoors from early morning until sundown. This luminous work, “Mangingisda”, from 1955 follows a long tradition that includes the likes of “Sunset- Return of the fishermen” from 1939 and “Banca” from 1951. Fernando Amorsolo portrays the sturdy lives of fishermen with nary a hint of belligerence. Just like his famous rice field scenarios, one is to search in vain for grim and hardened character bearing slavish burdens. This vibrant work in oil on canvas, depicting the daily rounds of fishermen, is striking in color and composition. The color treatment is considerably rich. If the viewer would not identify the work as a nighttime scene, one would assume by the chromatic brightness that it was very early in the daytime or very late in the afternoon. The beach scene with its soft, yet warm colors, and roughly turbulent surfaces suggest movement of the sea and the light as it unveils the scene it enfolds. Enhancing these scenes is the presence of the fishermen, but they do not dominate or overwhelm, instead they serve to give the mind an impression of the vastness of the world through which they move.