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[Dennis L. Fiddle]

[Asia Times News][See below for text index]

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Iola Lenzi, for Asia Times, 9th April 1997

[Bond Book] ---------------------------------------------------------

Vietnamese and Filipino paintings enjoyed a bidding
bonanza as South east Asia's biannual art auctions
unfolded in Singapore last week. The city-state's most
lucrative art sales to date, with combined earnings for
Sotheby's and Christie's topping the S$11 million
(US$7.67 million) mark, proved a huge hit for artists
from the region, though a Walter Spies oil could be had
for a bargain S$750,000.

Sotheby's second sale of Southeast Asian paintings
garnered S$4,208,395, improving on last year's figures by
30 percent. Sotheby's Singapore director Quek Chin Yeow
was at the rostrum and although bidding was patchy at
times, with over 40 percent of lots re- maining
unclaimed, Sotheby's sold many of their lots well.

The most expensive picture at Sotheby's was Spies'
Landscape, sold to an Asian private collector for
S$1,103,000 including a premium, a world record for the
artist. European pioneers Adrien Le Mayeur and Emil
Rizek, perennial favorites when interpreting Asian
themes, generally fetched over estimate both at
Christie's and Sotheby's. Rizek's Pasar in Bali set a new
world record for the artist at Sotheby's, going for
S$168,750 to the Jakarta trade.

One anticipated record that was not set at Sotheby's was
for cover lot Lee Man Fong's Life in Bali. The painting
failed to reach its reserve of S$700,000 when bidding
stopped at S$650,000.

A name that virtually guaranteed a sale was Amorsolo.
Christie's and Sotheby's can't seem to get enough of the
Filipino's Renoiresque portraits of fleshy peasant girls
wielding clay pots or mangoes, and no wonder, with
bidding usually tripling and quadrupling high estimate.

According to Christie's expert Job Ubbens, Amorsolo
attracts regional interest up to the S$100,000 mark, with
Filipino buyers prepared to bid well past that figure.
Even a view of a church such as Christie's Porta Baja,
Cavite, an Amorsolo from 1927, fetched S$55,000, doubling
the S$25,000 to S$35,000 estimate.

Another Filipino artist, Fabian De La Rosa, was popular
too - his Portrait of an Old Man selling well at
Christie's in spite of its poor condition. "Growing
affluence in the Philippines, as well as regional
collectors' appreciation of Filipino artistic talent are
pushing the Filipino market to new heights. We hope to
include a broader spectrum of artists in our autumn
sale," said Ubbens.

Quek of Sotheby's Singapore hinted that his company was
considering opening a Manila office in the
not-too-distant future.

First-generation artists generally commanded high bids
when the subject was relevant to Asia. The better of
Sotheby's two Raden Saleh, Fighting Animals, though
unsigned and poss - ibly a fragment, shot well over
estimate to S$773,750 including premium, confirming the
appeal of the region's indigenous pioneer artists.
Christie's larger and well-documented Saleh doubled its
high estimate to fetch just under S$2 million.

In contrast, European pioneers such as Willem Hofker did
not fare well with European subjects, underlining the
market's growing sophistication. Said Quek: "Regional
collectors are far more discriminating than they were
even 18 months ago."

With the market now including art from countries other
than Indonesia, Vietnam and the Philippines, for example,
bidders are clearly becoming more selective. A Le Mayeur
such as Enjoying the Beach that might have sold a couple
of years ago purely on the strength of the signature,
probably failed to find a buyer at Sotheby's because its
S$40,000 to S$50,000 estimate did not reflect the
painting's small size, lack of depth, lack of tropical
foliage and sketchier-than-usual figures.

According to Bali-based Indonesian paintings specialist,
Niki Gifford, competition and bounty are making buyers
more price sensitive in the well-established categories
of Indonesian and Malaysian-Singaporean painting. "Hendra
was much higher two years ago but now the once overheated
contemporary Indones ian market seems to have
stabilized," he said.

If regional buyers are proving price sensitive where the
run-of-the-mill lots are concerned, they are all the more
aware of the importance of unique or extraordinary works
and accordingly, prepared to go all out to purchase them.
As if to prove the market's growing refinement, Hendra's
historically important tribute to the Indonesian
revolution, War and Peace, commanded a healthy S$135,000,
nearly doubling its high estimate.

Christie's, the veteran of Southeast Asian painting sales
in Singapore, surpassed its anticipated target of S$4
million to make S$6,210,095 with 95 percent of lots sold
in value.

Their new Vietnamese painting section proved a success,
fetching more than S$300,000. Buyers favored artists such
as Mai Trung Thu and Le Pho, whose more decorative works
attracted frenzied bidding from the room and on the
telephone.

According to Christie's Ubbens, the buyers of Vietnamese
art include mainly Europeans, Vietnamese and Indonesians
from both trade and private spheres. The market is
somewhat overheated, with some rather weak pieces like Le
Pho's A Nude Washing Her Hair managing to achieve a
respectable S$5,000.

"There were many new faces in the auction rooms this
spring. New buyers probably account for some of the
crazier prices we saw last weekend," said Gifford.

Christie's Vietnamese art consultant, Jean Francois
Hubert, said Vietnamese pictures would be a permanent
feature of future Southeast Asian painting sales.

"This category draws international interest. In spite of
the seemingly high prices achieved in Singapore [last
week], there is still much room for growth."

One price that was disappointing rather than crazy was
the conservative S$750,000 bid for Christie's Walter
Spies Tierfabel, the painting barely selling on the
reserve. A charming and early work with an excellent
provenance, experts were suggesting Tierfabel had only
just scraped by due to its subject, the Garden of Eden,
unpopular with Asian buyers.

"This is a key picture in the oeuvre of Spies," said
Ubbens after the sale. "I suspect many will come to
regret letting this one go so reasonably." Gifford
agreed, saying there were probably fewer than 60 Spies
oils in the world.

Always in the quest of new markets, Christie's followed
their Southeast Asian painting sale with a late Qing
ceramics single-owner sale. A new category for the
auctioneer, the 199 lots of porcelain from the reigns of
Xianfeng (1851-1861) Tongzhi (1862- 1874) Guangxu
(1875-1908) and Xuantong (1909-1911) made a total of
S$1,673,230.

The Yangzhitang Coll ect ion, belonging to Hong Kong
connoisseur Simon Kwan, had been widely exhibited in Hong
Kong, Taiwan and the United States and was relatively
certain of a good reception in Singapore, particularly as
estimates remained conservative. Indeed, being late 19th
and early 20th century, the pieces from the Yang zhitang
Collection are aesthetically akin to the Straits Chinese
or Nonya wares so cherished by Singaporeans keen on their
local heritage. Furthermore, later Qing porcelain remains
affordable compared to wares from the earlier imperial
reigns of Kangxi or Qianlong.

"We are keen to expand our range in Singapore," said
Christie's Singapore director Irene Lee.

"Wine was a big success last year and will now be an
annual category. Later imperial porcelain has had an
excellent response this spring so we shall make that a
fixture as well; including Nonya wares in this type of
sale once in a while."

Indeed, the Kwan sale was perfectly tailored to the
Singaporean audience. Estimates were kept well below Hong
Kong porcelain prices.

The catalog boasted 17 pages of "aca- demic" text,
explaining and giving import- ance to pieces that might
not have culled much interest in Hong Kong even a few
years ago.

As part of a single-owner sale, the lots on offer formed
a cohesive whole. Finally, the name of the collector
coupled with his international reputation added to the
pieces' credibility and prestige.

Whatever detractors said previous to the sale, judging by
the figures, Christie's has cleverly established a new
category, satisfying local porcelain collectors by
substituting bountiful late Qing porcelain for Straits
Chinese wares whose quantities were dwindling.

In addition to catering to regional buyers, Christie's
says bids came from further afield, in particular from
Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan and the US.

A number of Hong Kong's top porcelain dealers were
spotted attending the sale, observing, possibly buying
and certainly keenly interested in a trend in the making.

Singapore's 1997 spring art auctions seem to have marked
a turning point. With sales shooting past S$10 million,
European journalists and dealers jostling with Hong Kong
collectors and regional buyers in the sale rooms, and new
categories being established specifically for the region,
Singapore need no longer fear not being taken seriously
as an art capital.

Iola Lenzi is a contributing writer for Asia Times based
in Singapore.

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