VietNamNet Bridge – Le Pho is known for his painting which has been sold at the highest price among Vietnamese painters. His “Girl picks up flowers” was auctioned for $339,797.

His paintings have been auctioned by prestigious auctioneers like Christie’s and Sotheby’s. There are several paintings by Le Pho still in Vietnam. Recently, collector Nguyen Quoc Cuong presented Le Pho’s “Young woman” at Dinh Tien Hoang exhibition center, Hanoi. The piece was painted in August 1935 before the artist settled in France. At that time, Pho decorated the royal palace in Hue city city and painted portraits of King Bao Dai and Queen Nam Phuong.

The painting depicts a woman wearing a yellow silk dress with the manner of a mandarin’s wife. The painting frame is made of ivory.

Le Pho’s paintings arewith most expensive in Vietnam. Gallery Leslie Hintman in 2007 valued Le Pho’s “Woman in Garden” (oil canvas, 104.1 x 83.8cm) at the price of $30,000-50,000. His small-sized paintings are sold for $6000-8000.

In the 10^th auction of Larasati’s in Singapore, Le Pho’s works were auctioned along the works by great names of Asia and Europe, such as Affandi, Hendra Gunawan, Sudjana Kerton (Indonesia), Wu Guanzhong (China), Le Mayuer (Belgium) and Rudolf Bonnet (Netherlands). His painting entitled “Mother and children” featuring a woman playing with her three children were offered for sale for $102,000-128,000.

Le Pho’s paintings are also auctioned by world famous auctioneers – Christie’s and Sotheby’s. His painting “Girl with blue scarf” was valued at $100,000-120,000, ranking third in the top five most expensive paintings in an auction of Sotheby’s in Hong Kong in 2009.

Women appear in many artworks by Le Pho. In the early period, women in Le Pho’s paintings are shy and slim, with oval faces.. After the artist focused on oil paintings, women remained his primary subject matter.

Vietnamese and oriental characteristics are clear in Le Pho’s paintings, especially in the way he depicts women and flowers. “He loves flowers and flowers always appear in his paintings in both periods of silk and oil paintings,” said Mrs. Vaux, his French wife.

Though the painter passed away ten years ago, at the age of 94, he still takes the lead among Vietnamese painters in terms of the number of paintings auctioned and theprices they reach.

Now recognized as one of the masters of the 20th century Vietnamese painting, Le Pho came from a family of mandarins - his father was the Viceroy of Tonkin. Le Pho was the tenth child in a family of twenty, Pho started painting at the age of 16, enrolled at the Ecole des Beaux Arts de l’Indochine in Hanoi and also taught painting. Le Pho traveled to Paris in 1932 to continue his education at the Ecole des Beaux Arts.

On his return to Hanoi he was appointed professor at the Hanoi Ecole des Beaux-Arts. In 1937 the artist went back to Paris as the artistic director of the Indochinese section at the Paris International Exhibition and as a jury member, and settled in Paris permanently. He had been the artistic advisor to the Embassy of Vietnam in Paris, and regularly exhibited at the Salon d’Automne and the Salon des Independants.

The artist was famous for his poetic paintings of flowers and women. Pho later married the French journalist of Times and Life, Paulette Vaux.

Le Pho’s artwork could be generally divided into two categories - the pastoral scenes in impressionist style with Vietnamese beauties and the very fine, calligraphic work done on silk, a blend of East and West techniques and aesthetics. Pho’s works are presented in the Permanent collection of the Museum d’Art Moderne in Paris.

PV