PROPERTY FROM THE D ON BENITO J. LEGARD A JR. COLLECTI ON
Justiniano Asunción (1816 - 1901)
"Costumes of Manilla" (sic)
Tipos del Pais (People of the Country)
Inscribed on the cover, “Purchased 31st December 1843”,
according to Dr. Legarda’s type written notes
signed and dated (lower right) e ach
watercolor on paper
14" x 9" (36 cm x 23 cm) each
RO M T H E D O N B E N I TO J . L E G A R D A J R . C O L L E C T I O N
TIPOS DEL PAIS BY JUSTINIANO ASUNCIÓN
R A R E G E M S C R E AT E D A N D S I G N E D B Y T H E M A S T E R
by L I S A G U E R R E RO N A K P I L
Consisting of Sixteen (16) works in outstanding
condition, titled in Spanish with an English
translation below it, both indicated as follows:
1. Indio Yloco. Indian of the Province of Yloco.
2. Pescador de Malabon. Malabon Fisherman.
3. El pobre mendigando. Blind beggar (taken from life).
4. Carreta de Palay. Sledge for transporting Paddy (sic)
5. Vendedora de Arros. Rice Woman.
6. El Indio del Campo. An Indian Ploughing
7. El viefo vestido antiguo. Old man in ancient costume.
8. La Mestiza española. Spanish mestiza (Spanish &
Indian blood) in walking dress.
9. Esterera de Tipas. Mat maker of Fipas (sic)
10. La India arrosera. Luzon or large wooden mortar
used for separating the husk from the paddy (sic).
11. La viefa de vestida antigua. Old woman in
ancient costume.
12. Mestiza Bañando. Mestiza bathing
13. Vendedora de Pescado, Fisherwoman
14. Jugador de gallo de Malabon. Actual likeness
of a Celebrated Cock-fighter.
15. La Mestiza española. Spanish mestiza
(Spanish & Indian blood) in church dress.
16. El mestiza Indio y Chino. Indian mestiza
(Indian & Chinese blood.)
Justiniano Asunción, known as “Capitan Ting”
in Sta. Cruz after his appointment as the capitanmunicipal
of that prosperous Manila district, was
however more famous on two continents for his art.
Asunción is presumed to have taken lessons in the
last years of the first Manila Academia de Dibujo,
established by Damian Domingo, himself widely held
to be as the father of Filipino painting. The academy,
however, closed with Domingo’s abrupt death in 1834.
Asunción is, however considered one of his most
worthy successors in the painting of the celebrated
Tipos del Pais.
The Tipos del Pais has been described by art
historian Florina Capistrano-Baker, an expert in this
field, as “Philippine export watercolors that capture
the inhabitants, costumes, and occupations of the
country.” They were, in particular ‘trophies of trade’,
commissioned by what she termed as elite merchants
and fellow travelers to symbolize their pelf and power.
These were the wealthy traders of New England
and Massachusetts who became enormously rich
by importing sugar from the Philippines to make
American rum, the country’s indigo for factories on the
eastern seaboard, and marine-grade hemp to make
ropes for the bustling ship-building business in Salem.
Dazzlingly, this all occurred a half-century before the
United States paid for formal control of the Philippines
to the Spanish in 1898.
Two American trading firms are known to have
operated in Manila in the 1820s : Peele Hubbell & Co.
(whose American flag flies over its warehouse depicted
and correctly identified by Capistrano-Baker in a
unique Letras y Figuras that recently came to auction
at León Gallery. That work is an extraordinary example
in English, titled Views of Manila.
The other American entity is the rather better-known
Russel & Sturgis Co. who had ties not just in Manila
but also to Canton, China.
There are several of these watercolors that have
become familiar to collectors, but there are others that
are rarely seen or only now to be presently discovered.
These include El pobre mendigando (Blind Beggar,
taken from life) which shows a well-dressed xxxx. led by
a young boy; the Mestiza Bañando (Mestiza Bathing);
and Jugador de Gallo de Malabon (Actual likeness of
a Celebrated Cock-fighter.) The latter appears to be
truly more of a pocket fan’s portrait, the 19th-century
equivalent of a Michael Jordan basketball trading card.
The sportsman’s features are so well outlined including
his mustache.
While the watercolors of mestizas in street and
church ensembles, for example, may be known to
aficionados, these particular renditions are far more
vibrant and life-like. Capistrano-Baker has written
about tell-tale signs of Asunción’s work, only visible
with magnification, that give them a subtle but
certain unmistakeable and magical quality.
Furthermore, Asunción’s name is Anglicized in the
watercolors as Justiniano Asumpcion (for Assumption);
as are all the sub-titles of all the works, presumably
to make it easier for the American buyer to enjoy
these souvenirs of his new-found wealth.
The works at hand were inscribed on their cover as
“Purchased 31st December 1843,” according to the
notes of Don Benito J. Legarda Jr, making them the
same age as the Princeton works.
Legarda incidentally was one of the few historians that
specialized in the early Philippine-American trade of the
1800s, adding another dimension to the reason that he
collected these rare masterpieces. He was the author
of the important work titled After the Galleons: Foreign
Trade, Economic Change, and Entrepreneurship in
the Nineteenth-Century Philippines, published by the
Ateneo de Manila University Press.
There are at present only a handful of works to
have been signed by Justiniano Asunción in the
United States’ museum collections : In 2006, writes
Capistrano-Baker, “a previously unknown and
heretofore unpublished group of Tipos del Pais
attributed to Asunción in the collection of the Harvey S.
Firestone Library at Princeton University came to (her)
attention. This collection includes sixteen images of
Philippine costumes, with four inscribed ‘Por Justiniano
Assump.n año de 1843.’ The four signed works at
Princeton portray popular mestiza images similar to
those in the New York album.” Those works at the
New York Public Library, incidentally are not signed
and Capistrano-Baker has theorized that nine of them
may be by Asunción.
This collection of never-before-seen Asunción works is
triply significant not only because of their outstanding
beauty and condition as well as irreproachable
provenance but for the rarity of having each and
every work signed.
