LÊ PHO (1907-2001). - Lot 113

LÊ PHO (1907-2001). Indochina School of Fine Arts. Class of 1930. Young women with bouquet. Gouache and ink on silk signed lower right in ideograms and cursive letters in its period frame in velvet and gilded wood imitating bamboo. Circa 1955. Size: 42x41 cm. Size with frame: 55x55 cm. Provenance: Galerie Romanet, personal collection of the gallery owner. The work will appear in the artist's catalog raisonné currently being prepared by Alain Le Kim, the artist's successor in title. Lê Pho settled permanently in France in 1937. His encounter with Matisse was decisive, initiating a pictorial revolution in his work. Later on, successive events would change his life and his art. Resolutely influenced by the Impressionists in general, and by Bonnard too, his style, which reflected the world of Confucian scholars, evolved towards a rich palette of colors. The work we present reflects this eventful artistic journey, and marks the culmination of a pictorial quest typical of the "Romanet period". The blended colors of the early period are no longer the order of the day here, and contrasts are marked. The shimmering bouquet, magnified by the wucai porcelain vase, invades the space to the point of occupying a central place in the composition. More than a portrait of women, the subject is the preparation of a bouquet towards which all the lines converge. The tight framing of this scene makes it a gentle, intimate snapshot, a moment suspended in the elegant gesture of the woman in the foreground. Nothing seems to be able to disturb this latent melancholy imbued with poetry. While the young woman in the background seems to be busying herself, holding the bouquet in her left hand, the woman in the foreground has a decidedly different attitude. Pensive, her right hand resting on the table, she delicately grasps a delphinium flower between her fingers. How can we fail to make the connection with floral symbolism, in which delphinium is the flower of attachment and tenderness, just as the color blue evokes melancholy and love? The silent language of flowers is well known to Lê Pho, who always gives them pride of place in his compositions, particularly during this period. Flowers, which underline the tender expression on women's faces, occupy a central place in Vietnamese culture. Floral references abound in texts, are omnipresent during Tet and are widely represented in everyday language. The painting's title could be Mat hoa, literally "flowery face", describing a beautiful feminine face. As always with Lê Pho, Vietnamese culture shines through, the form changing, the background constant and imbued with a scholar's heritage, like a link to a tradition that the artist has always preserved.