Fernando Cueto Amorsolo

Birthdate: May 30, 1892

Birthplace: Paco, Metro Manila, Philippines
Death: April 24, 1972 (79)
St. Lukes Medical Center, Quezon City, Metro
Manila, Philippines
Immediate Family: Son of Pedro Amorsolo and Bonifacia Cueto
Husband of Salud Tolentino Amorsolo and Ma.
Rosalina San Buenaventura Amorsolo
Father of Private; Private; Virginia Jorge
Ballesteros; Fernando Jorge Amorsolo; Adrian
Jorge Amorsolo and 15 others
Brother of Alejandro Cueto Amorsolo; Pablo
Cueto Amorsolo; Private and Private

Occupation: Painter

Amorsolo was born on May 30, 1892, in Paco, Manila.[4][5] Don Fabián de la Rosa,
his mother's cousin, was also a Filipino painter. At the age of 13, Amorsolo
became an apprentice to De la Rosa, who would eventually become the
advocate and guide to Amorsolo's painting career. During this time, Amorsolo's
mother embroidered to earn money, while Amorsolo helped by selling water color
postcards to a local bookstore for 10 centavos each. His brother, Pablo
Amorsolo, was also a painter. 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.
Between 1909 and 1914, he enrolled at the Art School of the Liceo de
Manila.[citation needed]
After graduating from the Liceo, he entered the University of the Philippines'
School of Fine Arts, where De la Rosa worked at the time. During college,
Fernando Amorsolo's primary influences were the Spanish people court
painter Diego Velázquez, John Singer Sargent, Anders Zorn, Claude
Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, but mostly his contemporary Spanish
masters Joaquín Sorolla Bastida and Ignacio Zuloaga. Amorsolo's most notable
work as a student at the Liceo was his painting of a young man and a young
woman in a garden, which won him the first prize in the art school exhibition
during his graduation year. To make money during school, Amorsolo joined
competitions and did illustrations for various Philippine publications, including
Severino Reyes’ first novel in Tagalog language, Parusa ng Diyos ("Punishment
of God"), Iñigo Ed. Regalado's Madaling Araw ("Dawn"), as well as illustrations
for editions of the Pasion. Amorsolo graduated with medals from the University of
the Philippines in 1914
After graduating from the University of the Philippines, Amorsolo worked as
a draftsman for the Bureau of Public Works, as a chief artist at the Pacific
Commercial Company, and as a part-time instructor at the University of the
Philippines (where he would work for 38 years). After three years as an instructor
and commercial artist, Amorsolo was given a grant to study at the Academia de
San Fernando in Madrid, Spain by Filipino businessman Enrique Zóbel de Ayala.
During his seven months in Spain, Amorsolo sketched at museums and along
the streets of Madrid, experimenting with the use of light and color. Through the
Zóbel grant, Amorsolo was also able to visit New York City, where he
encountered postwar impressionism and cubism, which would be major
influences on his work.
Amorsolo set up his own studio upon his return to Manila and painted
prodigiously during the 1920s and the 1930s. His Rice Planting (1922), which
appeared on posters and tourist brochures, became one of the most popular
images of the Commonwealth of the Philippines. Beginning in the 1930s,
Amorsolo's work was exhibited widely both in the Philippines and abroad. His
bright, optimistic, pastoral images set the tone for Philippine painting before
World War II. Except for his darker World War II-era paintings, Amorsolo painted
quiet and peaceful scenes throughout his career.
Amorsolo was sought after by influential Filipinos including Luis Araneta, Antonio
Araneta and Jorge B. Vargas. Amorsolo also became the favourite Philippine
artist of United States officials and visitors to the country. Due to his popularity,
Amorsolo had to resort to photographing his works and pasted and mounted
them in an album. Prospective patrons could then choose from this catalog of his
works. Amorsolo did not create exact replicas of his trademark themes; he
recreated the paintings by varying some elements.
His works later appeared on the cover and pages of children textbooks, in
novels, in commercial designs, in cartoons and illustrations for the Philippine
publications such The Independent, Philippine Magazine, Telembang, El
Renacimiento Filipino, and Excelsior. He was the director of the University of the
Philippine's College of Fine Arts from 1938 to 1952.
During the 1950s until his death in 1972, Amorsolo averaged to finishing 10
paintings a month. However, during his later years, diabetes, cataracts, arthritis,
headaches, dizziness and the death of two sons affected the execution of his
works. Amorsolo underwent a cataract operation when he was 70 years old, a
surgery that did not impede him from drawing and painting.
Amorsolo was a close friend of the Philippine sculptor Guillermo Tolentino, the
creator of the Caloocan City monument to the patriot Andrés Bonifacio.
Amorsolo is best known for his illuminated landscapes,[6] which often portrayed
traditional Filipino customs, culture, fiestas and occupations. His pastoral works
presented "an imagined sense of nationhood in counterpoint to American colonial
rule" and were important to the formation of Filipino national identity.[2] He was
educated in the classical tradition and aimed "to achieve his Philippine version of
the Greek ideal for the human form."[7] In his paintings of Filipina women,
Amorsolo rejected Western ideals of beauty in favor of Filipino ideals[8] and was
fond of basing the faces of his subjects on members of his family.[9]
[The women I paint should have] a rounded face, not of the oval type often
presented to us in newspapers and magazine illustrations. The eyes should be
exceptionally lively, not the dreamy, sleepy type that characterizes the
Mongolian. The nose should be of the blunt form but firm and strongly marked. ...
So the ideal Filipina beauty should not necessarily be white complexioned, nor of
the dark brown color of the typical Malayan, but of the clear skin or fresh colored
type which we often witness when we met a blushing girl.
— Fernando Amorsolo[8]
Amorsolo used natural light in his paintings and developed
the backlighting technique Chiaroscuro, which became his artistic trademark and
his greatest contribution to Philippine painting.[3][4][10] In a typical Amorsolo
painting, figures are outlined against a characteristic glow, and intense light on
one part of the canvas highlights nearby details.[4] Philippine sunlight was a
constant feature of Amorsolo's work; he is believed to have painted only one
rainy-day scene.[4]
Sketches[edit]
Amorsolo was an incessant sketch artist,[8] often drawing sketches at his home,
at Luneta Park, and in the countryside.[9] He drew the people he saw around him,
from farmers to city-dwellers coping with the Japanese occupation.[8] Amorsolo's
impressionistic tendencies, which may be seen in his paintings as well, were at
their height in his sketches.[8] His figures were not completely finished but were
mere "suggestions" of the image.[8]
Historical paintings and portraits[edit]
Amorsolo also painted a series of historical paintings on pre-Colonial and
Spanish Colonization events. Amorsolo's Making of the Philippine Flag, in
particular, was widely reproduced. His The First Baptism in the
Philippines required numerous detailed sketches and colored studies of its
elements. These diverse elements were meticulously and carefully set by the
artist before being transferred to the final canvas. For his pre-colonial and 16th-
century depiction of the Philippines, Amorsolo referred to the written accounts
of Antonio Pigafetta, other available reading materials, and visual sources He
consulted with the Philippine scholars of the time, H. Pardo de Tavera
and Epifanio de los Santos.[11]
Amorsolo also painted oil portraits of Presidents like General Emilio Aguinaldo,
and other prominent individuals such as Don Alfredo Jacób and Doña Pura
Garchitorena Toral of Camarines Sur. He also painted the wedding picture of
Don Mariano Garchitorena and Doña Caridad Pamintuan of Pampanga.
He also did a portrait of American Senator Warren Grant Magnuson (1905–
1989), of the Democratic Party from Washington, whom the Warren G.
Magnuson Health Sciences Building at the University of Washington, and the
Warren G. Magnuson Clinical Center at the National Institutes of Health in
Bethesda, Maryland are named after.

World War II-era works[edit]

After the onset of World War II, Amorsolo's typical pastoral scenes were replaced
by the depictions of a war-torn nation. During the Japanese occupation of the
Philippines during World War II, Amorsolo spent his days at his home near the
Japanese garrison, where he sketched war scenes from the house's windows or
rooftop.[9]
During the war, he documented the destruction of many landmarks in Manila and
the pain, tragedy and death experienced by Filipino people, with his subjects
including "women mourning their dead husbands, files of people with pushcarts
and makeshift bags leaving a dark burning city tinged with red from fire and
blood."[11] Amorsolo frequently portrayed the lives and suffering of Filipina women
during World War II. Other World War II-era paintings by Amorsolo include a
portrait in absentia of General Douglas MacArthur as well as self-portraits and
paintings of Japanese occupation soldiers.[4] In 1948, Amorsolo's wartime
paintings were exhibited at the Malacañang Presidential Palace.[4]

Critical evaluation[edit]
Amorsolo's supporters consider his portrayals of the countryside as "the true
reflections of the Filipino Soul."[7]
Amorsolo has been accused, however, of succumbing to commercialism and
merely producing souvenir paintings for American soldiers.[7] Critic Francisco
Arcellana wrote in 1948 that Amorsolo's paintings "have nothing to say" and that
they were not hard to understand because "there is nothing to
understand."[7] Critics have criticized Amorsolo's portraits of Philippine
Commonwealth personalities, his large, mid-career anecdotal works, and his
large historical paintings.[7] Of the latter, critics have said that his "artistic
temperament was simply not suited to generating the sense of dramatic tension
necessary for such works."[7]
Another critic, however, while noting that most of Amorsolo's estimated ten
thousand works were not worthy of his talent, argues that Amorsolo's oeuvre
should nonetheless judged by his best works instead of his worst.[7] Amorsolo's
small landscapes, especially those of his early career, have been judged as his
best works, "hold[ing] well together plastic-ally."[7] Amorsolo may "be considered
a master of the Philippine landscape as landscape, even
outranking Luna and Hidalgo who also did some Philippine landscapes of the
same measurements."[7]

Legacy[edit]
Four days after his death, Amorsolo was honored as the first National Artist in
Painting at the Cultural Center of the Philippines by then-President Ferdinand
Marcos.[citation needed] The volume of paintings, sketches and studies of Amorsolo is
believed to have reached more than 10,000 pieces. Amorsolo was an important
influence on contemporary Filipino art and artists, even beyond the so-called
"Amorsolo school."[7] Amorsolo's influence can be seen in many landscape
paintings by Filipino artists, including early landscape paintings by abstract
painter Federico Aguilar Alcuaz.[7]
In 2003, Amorsolo's children founded the Fernando C. Amorsolo Art Foundation,
which is dedicated to preserving Fernando Amorsolo's legacy, promoting his
style and vision, and preserving a national heritage through the conservation and
promotion of his works.[12]
During the post-war period, Insular Life commissioned Amorsolo to create a
series of paintings of historical events for their offices (and which were
subsequently used in Insular Life calendars from '50s to '80s). [1].
===Amorsolo paintings in Wellesley, Massachusetts, two original 1950s paintings
by Amorsolo, The Cockfight and Resting Under the Trees, were bought by a New
Jersey collector for $36,000 and $31,500, respectively.[13] During a 2002 episode
of Antiques Roadshow, a Sotheby's antiques appraiser estimated that an
attendee's signed 1945 rural landscape painting by Amorsolo could fetch
between $30,000 and $50,000 at auction.[14] At a 1996 Christie's auction,
Amorsolo's The Marketplace went for $174,000.[15] In April 2002, Portrait of
Fernanda De Jesus was bought for US$377,947.
On November 30, 2009, the Family Gathering Fruit sold for US$77,257 at
Christie's. In December 2009, Fruit Gatherer was auctioned off in Maryland, in
record-breaking manner, topping 19th- and 20th-century European and American
paintings. In May 2010, the highest priced Amorsolo painting was auctioned off at
Christie's for about US$440,000.

Major works by Amorsolo include:[10]

 Babaeng nagbabasa
 Afternoon Meal of the Workers (Noonday Meal of the Rice Workers) (1939)
 Assassination of Governor Bustamante
 Bataan
 The Bombing of the Intendencia (1942)
 The Building of Intramuros
 Burning of the Idol
 The Burning of Manila (1946)
 El Ciego (1928)
 The Conversion of the Filipinos (1931)
 Corner of Hell
 Dalagang Bukid (1936)
 Defense of a Filipina Woman's Honor (1945)
 La destruccion de Manila por los salvajes japoneses (The Destruction of
Manila by the Savage Japanese)
 Early Filipino State Wedding
 Early Sulu Wedding
 The Explosion (1944)
 The First Baptism in the Philippines
 The First Mass in the Philippines
 Fruit Gatherer (1950)
 Fruit Pickers Harvesting Under The Mango Tree (1939)
 Maiden in a Stream (1921)
 Making of the Philippine Flag
 Marca Demonio (1917)
 The Mestiza (1943)
 My Wife, Salud (1920)
 One Casualty
 Our Lady of Light (1950)
 Planting Rice (1946)
 Princess Urduja
 The Rape of Manila (1942)
 Rice Planting (1922)
 Sale of Panay
 Sikatuna
 Sunday Morning Going To Town (1958)
 US Senator Warren Magnuson Oil Portrait (1958)
 Traders
 El Violinista (The Violinist)

 1908 – 2nd Prize, Bazar Escolta tea and taki (Asocacion Internacional de
Artistas), for Levendo Periodico
 1922 – 1st Prize, Commercial and Industrial Fair in the Manila Carnival
 1929 – 1st Prize, New York's World Fair, for Afternoon Meal of Rice
Workers (also known as Noonday Meal of the Rice Workers)
 1940 – Outstanding University of the Philippines Alumnus Award
 1959 – Gold Medal, UNESCO National Commission
 1961 – Rizal Pro Patria Award
 1961 – Honorary Doctorate in the Humanities, from the Far Eastern University
 1963 – Diploma of Merit from the University of the Philippines
 1963 – Patnubay ng Sining at Kalinangan Award, from the City of Manila
 1963 – Republic Cultural Heritage Award
 1972 – Gawad CCP para sa Sining, from the Cultural Center of the
Philippines[10]
In 1972, Fernando Amorsolo became the first Filipino to be distinguished as
the Philippine's National Artist in Painting. He was named as the "Grand Old Man
of Philippine Art" during the inauguration of the Manila Hilton's art center, where
his paintings were exhibited on January 23, 1969.
Major exhibitions[edit]
Outside the Philippines, his exhibitions were held in Belgium, at the Exposicion
de Panama in 1914, at a one-man show at the Grand Central Art Galleries in
New York City in 1925, and at the National Museum in Herran on November 6,
1948. During the 1931 Paris Exposition, Amorsolo exhibited one of his anecdotal
paintings, The Conversion of the Filipinos. Amorsolo's entries at
the Exposicion in Panama were a portrait of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson and
the piece La Muerte de Socrates. At the 1948 National Museum in Herran,
Amorsolo exhibition was sponsored by the Art Association of the Philippines. In
1950, Amorsolo exhibited two more historical paintings, Faith Among the
Ruins and Baptism of Rajah Humabon at ssthe Missionary Art Exhibit in Rome.
In 1979, Fernando Amorsolo's legacy as a painter was celebrated through an
exhibition of his works at the Art Center of the Manila Hilton.[6] His art was also
During his lifetime, Amorsolo was married twice and had 13 children. In 1916, he
married Salud Tolentino Jorge, with whom he had six children. Amorsolo's first
wife died in 1931 leaving him with six children. He had six more children by a
common-law wife, named Virginia Guevarra Santos. Amorsolo have three
children with her namely Manuel (followed in his father's footstep, with a degree
in Fine Arts from the University of the Philippines), Jorge and Norma when he
met his second wife. Subsequently, Virginia found an engagement ring in one of
Amorsolo's drawers; she knew about Maria, that prompted her to leave his house
with her three children. In 1935, he married Maria del Carmen who gave him
eight more children. Among her daughters are Sylvia Amorsolo-Lazo and Luz.
But as Maria was giving birth with his children, Virginia had three more children
with Amorsolo. His reputation was growing as fast as his brood and his work was
more than enough to provide for his rather large family. Six of Amorsolo's
children became artists themselves.
Salud Tolentino Jorge = 6
Virginia Guevarra Santos = 6
Maria del Carmen = 8
Total = 20 children