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Juan Luna y Novicio ¿A Do...Va la Nave? FROM PARIS TO CORDOBA TO MANILA: THE JOURNEY OF ¿A DO...VA LA NAVE? The present owner of ¿A Do...Va la Nave? acquired the painting by descent from his grandmother, Maria Alberta Esther Susana Pignocchi-Bonaldi. Her husband Jose Domingo Bonaldi, whose grandfather was the first vice consul of Italy to Argentina, received it as a gift from his business associate Goar Mestre, a media tycoon who fled his home country of Cuba upon the triumph of Fidel Castro and the Communist Revolution. Deciding to settle in Buenos Aires in 1959, Mestre then pioneered the television and mass communication industry in Argentina. Known as the “Czar of Television” by the Argentines, Mestre associated with the likes of President Juan Domingo and First Lady Evita Peron.  Mestre and Bonaldi, who were close friends, together established the first local TV station in Cordoba, Canal 13. The elements of family and friendship that are interlaced in the story of this painting have become part of the fabric of ¿A Do...Va la Nave?. Tracing the history of the painting led the specialist team at Salcedo Auctions to explore Luna’s ties to either Cuba or Argentina, as it is unknown where Mestre first got hold of the painting (telephone interview by the current owner with Ana Maria Mestre Martinez, daughter of Goar Mestre, Buenos Aires, April 2015). One plausible connection is through Felix Pardo de Tavera, the brother of Luna’s ill-fated wife Paz, who settled in Buenos Aires with his Argentinian wife Agustina Manigot and worked there both as a physician and as a sculptor (Pardo de Tavera’s bust portrait of the patriot Gen. Jose de San Martin is installed in the presidential palace of Casa Rosada). But considering the bad blood between Luna and the Pardo de Taveras - it was known that the family consequently destroyed all of his work in their possession - could this painting have been spared and crossed the Atlantic, later to be acquired by Mestre? Another theory that was investigated was Luna’s association with Spanish officials who had travelled between the Philippines, Spain, and Cuba. This included Ramón Blanco, Spanish Governor General of the Philippines (1893-96), and thereafter Captain General of Cuba (1897-98), whose portrait Luna had painted. Known for his conciliatory position towards the Filipino reformists, and for his friendship with the artist and Dr. Jose Rizal, could he have brought ¿A Do...Va la Nave? to Cuba? The complexities that surround the origins ¿A Do...Va la Nave? make this painting extremely important in the annals of Philippine art. The questions that it raises are of special significances to the study of Luna’s oeuvres. From its creation in Paris, to its finding a home over three generations in Cordoba, to the many possible paths it has travelled along the way, it is highly likely that this is the first time that ¿A Do...Va la Nave? has reached the shores of Juan Luna’s motherland. As a treasured heirloom representing the bond of family, Salcedo Auctions is extremely privileged to be given the opportunity to bring ¿A Do...Va la Nave? back to the Philippines. The multiplicity of meanings intertwined with its enigmatic past make it a true gem of 19th century Philippine painting that will surpass, and continue to exceed, any limitations of border, culture or time. Painted one year after Spoliarium garnered Juan Luna a gold medal in the 1884 Madrid Exposition of Fine Art, a signal achievement that raised the profile of the Filipino artist and, by extension, the reform movement on the international stage, this ravishing oil on canvas signed and dated ‘LVNA Paris 1885’ was thought to have been lost until its incredible discovery early this year in the central Argentinian city of Cordoba.  The location and dimensions of ¿A Do...Va la Nave? were indicated as unknown in the seminal book on the artist published by the Eugenio Lopez Foundation in 1980, the only record of its existence being a reproduction in the 31 May 1886 edition of the Barcelona-based literary journal Ilustracion Artistica of an engraving based on the artwork by M. Weber.   Created at the start of what would become a nine-year stay by Luna in the French capital, this allegorical work can be considered as an important transitional opus. Here, the artist reveals a more relaxed approach to subject matter as he shifts from the strict academic formalism of the Salon with its proclivity for grand historical scenes, and moves to more intimate genre scenes and a style that would be influenced by the tail-end of French Impressionism. This painterly candor was perhaps Luna’s way of encapsulating the frenetic energy of the city, where an increasingly successful artist such as he could be better exposed to leading dealers and collectors, and have the freedom of creative experimentation. In a way, Paris represented, in the words of the social historian Racquel A.G. Reyes, “emancipation.” “[B]y the late 19th century [it] had become the focus of new modes of learning, thinking, and living.  It was, to paraphrase Victor Hugo’s vivid description in his epigraph to Zola’s Paris, the ship of human Progress.” It is perhaps no coincidence then that ¿A Do...Va la Nave? shows a skiff bobbing along a turquoise sea. The passengers of the boat consist of six elegantly garbed women in evening dress sitting languidly, with the one perched highest presumably Luna’s most favored model, the distinguished looking and voluptuous Angela Duche. One of the women appears to be a bride, face concealed by a veil, while another carefree maiden swathed in chiffon stretches close to the edge, her inverted, comely countenance gazing teasingly at the spectator. What is curious here is that the women far outnumber the two men on the boat, the younger one dressed as a soldier sitting near the bow surrounded by the ladies, the other older gentleman seeming to be sketching alone on the stern. It is a wonder that the vessel has not capsized given the uneven distribution of the passengers. What does this curious scene all mean? The title of the painting borrows the coro of an unfinished 1841 poem by Jose de Espronceda, a 19th century Spanish Romantic poet, the lines speaking of the uncertainty of the sea: “Y alla va la nave; Quien sabe do va? [And there goes the ship; Who knows where it will go?] La Ilustracion Artistica interprets the picture of the boat moving into an unknown horizon, the grey clouds clearing into pinkish wisps of sky, the colors reflected in the beauteous costumes of the passengers boldly confident in the face of possible danger, as youthful hubris. Luna’s interest in romanticism, however, as evidenced by his reference to Espronceda may point to the artist’s exploration of an even more elusive artistic ideal—the lifelong search for the sublime. Another way of reading the painting is that of Luna, the ilustrado male, coming to terms with modern femininity. Belle Epoque Paris presented a challenge to the artist’s traditional view of women as reticent and subservient. Here, we see the artist as the young gentleman surrounded by fashionable and flirtatious muses whose pink cheeks, fulsome bosoms, and alabaster corporeality created an overpowering allure that presumably Luna found, much like the ship drifting into uncharted territory, difficult to control. He is, likewise, the old sage at the stern surveying the scene, his wisdom outweighing folly, staying the course and keeping the boat on even keel. There is a surprising addition in the La Ilustracion engraving that is clearly absent in the painting: a seventh woman who has fallen off the boat – a moralizing commentary perhaps by the artist. Tests on ¿A Do...Va la Nave? under a UV lamp by a professional conservator did not reveal any pentimento of this seventh woman. One can speculate, therefore, that the disparity between the reproduction in the publication and the painting as viewers see it today may have stemmed from the original patron of ¿A Do...Va la Nave? requesting Luna to remove the grim image not long after it was completed such that the pigment, which was used to replace it, underwent the same aging process as the rest of the paint layer.   Literature: La Ilustracion Artistica, Numero 231, Ano V, 31 de Mayo de 1886, pp. 192-93 Santiago Albano Pilar, Juan Luna The Filipino as Painter (Pasig: Eugenio Lopez Foundation, Inc., 1980), pp. 90–91 Raquel A.G. Reyes, Love, Passion and Patriotism: Sexuality and the Philippine Propaganda Movement, 1882-1892 (University of Washington Press, 2008), pp. 39-67   1885 55 x 104 cm (21 1/2 x 41 in) Oil on canvas