Pinoy Pride

Fernando Amorsolo (1892 - 1972)

THE PHILIPPINES PRIDES itself of having great and magnificent artists in many fields. Although obscured by history, they are stars who continue to shine. Fernando Amorsolo is one such star. Embodied in his own inspiration, the sun overwhelming the landscape with life-giving light, he rose from humble beginnings and became the favorite portraitist and landscape painter of many Filipinos and westerners alike, and one of the country’s most important master artists.
          Born in Calle Herran, Paco, Manila, on May 30, 1892, to bookkeeper Pedro Amorsolo and embroiderer Bonifacia Cueto,  Amorsolo grew up in Daet, Camarines Norte. Upon his father’s death,  Amorsolo and his mother moved back to Manila to live with painter Don Fabian de la Rosa, his mother’s cousin.
         At the age of 13, Amorsolo apprenticed under De la Rosa, who would eventually become the advocate and guide to Amorsolo’s painting career.             
         Amorsolo’s first success as a young painter came in 1908,  when his painting Leyendo el periódico took second place at the Bazar Escolta, a contest organized by the Asociacion Internacional de Artistas. Amorsolo enrolled at the Art School of the Liceo de Manila, where he earned honors for his paintings and drawings. Afterwards, he entered the University of the Philippines School of Fine Arts, where De la Rosa worked at the time.
         Amorsolo also designed the logo for Ginebra San Miguel (still in use up to this day) depicting the archangel Michael vanquishing the devil. The owner, Enrique Zobel de Ayala, was so impressed with him that he gave him a grant to study at the Academia de San Fernando in Madrid, Spain.  Through this grant, he was able to go to Spain, where he gained influence from the works of Diego Velasquez, El Greco (Kyriakos Theotokopoulos), Francisco de Goya, and Claude Monet, among others. In New York City, he encountered postwar impressionism and cubism, which would be major influences in his work.
         Amorsolo’s use of natural light in his paintings and the backlighting technique chiarascuro became his artistic trademark and his greatest contribution to Philippine painting. In a typical Amorsolo painting, figures are outlined against a characteristic glow, and intense light on one part of the canvas highlights the accompanying details. Philippine sunlight was a constant feature in Amorsolo’s work.
         Based on historical records and existing publication relics, the earliest regular komiks strip in the Philippines was that of Si Kiko at Si Angge, written by Iñigo Ed Regalado and illustrated by Amorsolo.
Just as his career was reaching its peak,  the Philippines found itself in the midst of World War II. Even during this dark period, Amorsolo chose to portray despair not with an emotional outpouring of grief.  The period after the war saw the blossoming of Amorsolo’s art. He went back to painting the bright, sun-drenched countryside scenes for which he was most well-known. He reached the peak of his popularity in the late 1940s and 1950s, garnering numerous awards and citations along the way.
         Amorsolo worked until the last years of his life and is said to have painted more than 10,000 pieces.  Although afflicted with diabetes, arthritis, a heart condition, and failing eyesight because of cataract, the popularity of his work barely waned.
         Even his late works featured the classic Amorsolo tropical sunlight. He is said to have hated ‘sad and gloomy’ paintings, and had made only one painting in which rain appears.
         Amorsolo died of heart failure on April 24, 1972, at the age of 79.  Four days after his death, Amorsolo was honored as the country’s first National Artist (Visual Arts). - Ernee Lawagan

Fernando Amorsolo Maytime in Antipolo Oil on canvas. 1943 collection: Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas.

Photo courtesy of Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) from the BSP Collection. Special thanks to Director Fe M. De La Cruz