JUAN LUNA

JUAN LUNA was born in Badoc, Ilocos Norte, on October 23, 1857.

The young Luna received his early education at the Ateneo Municipal and later at the Escuela Nautica de Manila.

In 1873, he became an apprentice officer and traveled to various Asian ports. Whenever his ship was in port in Manila, he took painting lessons in the Academia de Dibujo y Pintura of Fr. Agustin Saiz.

Influenced by his brother, Manuel Luna, who, according to Filipino patriot José Rizal, was a better painter than Juan himself.

Don Lorenzo Guerero, who easily recognized the young man's natural talent, was the first tutor of the young Luna.

In 1877 Manuel and Juan Luna traveled to Europe, where Manuel studied music and Juan painting.

Juan entered the Escuela de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, where he befriended the painter Don Alejo Vera.

Vera brought him to Rome for some of his commissions, and Luna was exposed to the art of the Renaissance painters.

Subsequently, he exhibited several canvases at the Exposicion General de Bellas Artes in Madrid and won a silver medal (2nd class) for "La Muerte de Cleopatra." 

Luna's growing reputation as an artist led to a pensionado (pension) scholarship at 600 pesos annually through the Ayuntamiento of Manila. The condition was that he was obliged to develop a painting which captured the essence of Philippine history which would then become the Ayuntamiento's property.

What really deeply influenced his mature period was "social realism," the extension into art of the socialist movement. However, despite experiments in what would now be called "proletarian art," the basic style of Luna remained classical, because classic dignity was what he desired for the Filipino and his dreamt-of republic.

In 1883 Luna started the painting demanded of him by the Ayuntamiento. In May 1884, he shipped the large canvas of the Spoliarium to Madrid for the year's Exposición Nacional de Bellas Artes. He was the first recipient of the three gold medals awarded in the exhibition and Luna gained recognition among the connoisseurs and art critics present.

The Spoliarium is very large, measuring four meters in height and seven meters in width.

The painting depicts the bodies of dead gladiators  being dragged from a Roman arena. In a half-lit corner, brutal force squeezed close together unbroken figures so realistically that fascinated and startled at the same time. A slain gladiator lay inert and unfeeling, despite the muscular stretching as it is pulled. At one side were an old Roman painfully eyeing his slain son, a widow bent over in tears for her dead husband, and onlookers mute and helpless to do anything -- all pressed together in deep protest against human insensitivity, unmitigated power, inexorable death. Juan Luna’s brief brushstrokes made him world famous deservedly.

  It was a classic example of Luna's Rome/Madrid period, characterized by a dramatic and allegorical style, frequently depicting heroic figures in deep tumult, in the grip of larger-than-life themes such as courage and country.

In ancient Rome, the word spoliarium referred to the Coliseum's morgue.

The sheer grandeur of the painting made it a symbolic and appropriate end to Luna's first artistic period. Certainly, the grand accolades it received throughout Europe marked it as the zenith of a spectacular academic career, and a high point of Filipino history. (Today the Spoliarium hangs in the Philippines National Museum and is considered a national treasure.)

Luna developed a friendly relationship with the King of Spain and was later commissioned by the Spanish Senate to paint a large canvas which was called the La Batalla de Lepanto (The Battle of Lepanto). This won a gold medal at the Exposicion Universal de Barcelona in 1888.

 El Pacto de Sangre (The Blood Compact) in accordance with the agreement he had with the Ayuntamiento of Manila. Depicted in this piece was the blood compact ceremony between the Datu Sikatuna, one of the lords in Bohol island, and the Spanish conquistador Miguel López de Legazpi. It is now displayed in the Malacañang Palace.

Luna's canvases show a distinct contrast to those of Hidalgo's. In contrast to the ever-delicate paintings of Hidalgo, Luna's work show more drama and bravura. A forceful dynamic man, Luna has his personality stamped on every canvas of his. His power and joie de vivre were notable characteristics of his works.

"Vigor and realism characterize his art. In a single brush stroke, he paints a fair of emotions that fills the beholder with drama and tragedy of his theme. Luna was graver, more profound in his emotions than Hidalgo. The latter was more pure, more serene in his feelings."

Luna sought inspiration not from his contemporaries, the Impressionists, but from the Romantic Delacroix, Rembrandt and Daumier from whom he learned imparting power and mysticism to his works. All these influences were incorporated in a style that was Luna's own.

October of 1884, Luna moved to Paris and began the second, and more beguiling period of his artistic work. His style began to move away from the dark colours of the academic palette and became increasingly lighter in colour and mood. This post-academic, or Parisian period, would continue until the artist's abrupt departure from the French capital in February 1893.

December 8, 1886, Luna married Maria de la Paz Pardo de Tavera, a sister of his friend Felix and Trinidad Pardo de Tavera.

couple traveled to Venice and Rome and settled in Paris

Luna was fond of painting his wife. September 23, 1892. He was arrested and

murder charges were filed against him.

During this 8 year in Paris, Luna painted Ensuenos de Amor (1886) which depicted the artist's wife intimately as she lay in bed seemingly oblivious to the artist's gaze, a work that demonstrated 'Luna at his spontaneous best'

Parisian Life, (also known as Interior d'un Cafi) dated in 1892 is a work from this distinctive period. Even more importantly, it dates fro the last year of Luna's own Parisian life, painted barely a few months before the artist would be caught up in dramatic events that would climax in September 1892.

To one side, Jose Rizal, Ariston Bautista Lin, and Luna himself can be seen.

Parisian Life encapsulates the intangible ideas of the Filipino national consciousness. Dressed in European top hats and coats, with an air of exuberant self-confidence as they enjoy a moment in a Parisian cafe, the 3 gentlemen have embraced the Western lifestyle while remaining passionately Filipino at heart.

La Marquesa de Monte Olivar

In Philippine art criticism, Luna's paintings are loosely described as "impressionistic." This is a fine example of a Philippine impressionist work. Luna was intrigued by the Impressionists and was quick to grasp the essence of their style. He described his own works to compatriot Jose Rizal, another Filipino in Europe, as a "mosaic of pure colors of the rainbow. " Luna applied colors directly from the paint tube, dabbing his applications side by side on the canvas, allowing the viewer's eyes to blend them together to form a unified image. Although the Marquesa's face is achieved through thinly applied layers of paint, her figure was subjected to thicker layers of paint.

TAMPUHAN Luna's Tampuhan is a depiction of two persons

staying inside the sala or living room of a house. The two people are Filipino lovers sulking  – experiencing "tampo"  – because of an argument. The man is looking out at the street from a window. The woman on the other hand is focusing her eyes on the floor of the room. According to Rosalinda Orosa, the man is Ariston Bautista Lin, a friend of Luna who studied medicine in Europe. Orosa further described that the woman is Emiliana Trinidad. Trinidad is the ancestor of the owner of the painting, and is claimed by Orosa to be the same woman who posed for Luna's La Bulaqueña, another Luna artwork that illustrates Filipino culture.

"total silent treatment" between them is evident.

UNA BULAQUEÑA

Makes use of a single figure painted in limited vertical space

Used few colors and shapes Center of focus is the pensive face the overlapped hands forms an axis in the center of

the painting Diagonal pink and black stripes on the overskirt

provide the balance for the lower portion of the painting

He traveled back to the Philippines in December 1899 upon hearing of the death of his brother Antonio who was in Hong Kong in exile. On December 7, 1899, Luna suffered a heart attack and died there.

Félix Resurrección Hidalgo

(21 February 1855 - 13 March 1913)

Painter.

Third of seven children of Eduardo Resurreccion Hidalgo, landed proprietor and lawyer, and Maria Barbara Padilla, entrepreneur.

University of Santo Tomas where his artistry was encouraged.

He studied law, which he never finished

1871---enrolled at the Escuela de Dibujo y Pintura under, Spanish painter, Agustin Saez

1877--awarded second place in the contest for best cover design for the de luxe edition of Fr Manuel Blanco's Flora de Filipinas (Plants of the Philippines).

1879-- left for Spain as a pensionado in fine arts of the Ayuntamiento of Manila. He attended the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando de Madrid, whose courses he described in a letter to lose Rizal as obsolete and boring.

His Las virgenes Cristianas expuestas al populacho (The Christian virgins Exposed to the Populace), was awarded the ninth silver medal at the 1884 Exposicion General de Bells Artes in Madrid. In the same exposition Luna's Spoliarium was awarded a gold medal.

In the Exposicion General de las Islas Filipinas in Madrid in 1887, Resurreccion Hidalgo presented La barcade Aqueronte (The Boat of Charon) and Laguna estigia (The Styx) for which he received a gold medal.

La barca was again shown at the Exposition Universelle de Paris and was awarded a silver medal by an international jury.

Have been an acquaintance and inspiration for members of the Philippine reform movement

1884- Madrid Exposition of Fine Arts-silver medal Juan Luna(gold)

a major highlight in the memoirs of members of the Philippine reform movement

1904---Hidalgo received a gold medal for his overall participation at the Universal Exposition in St. Louis, Missouri

Canvases for Spanish Colonial Government:Filipino Warriors Guarding the Tomb of their ChiefDefeat of LimahongLa en fermaThrough Peace and LibertyAssisination of Governor Bustamante

1913-Died at Sarrea Spain

La Barca de Aqueronte, 1887, Museo Nacional de Pintura (Madrid).

LAS VIRGENES CRISTIANAS EXPUESTAS AL POPULACHO (THE

CHRISTIAN VIRGINS EXPOSED TO THE POPULACE)

OTHER PAINTINGS

*A lady in the Moonlight *La Madre en el Claustro

Thank you for listening!