Isidro Ancheta (Filipino 1882-1946)
Landscape
Oil on canvas
Signed lower left. Undated, circa 1930
9” x 13”
10” x 14” with frame

Excellent condition

Provenance: Private collection, US

Filipino landscape painter Isidro Ancheta was born in San Miguel on October 15, 1882. He attended primary and secondary schools at Ateneo de Manila, also finishing there with a Bachelor of Arts in 1904. Continuing his academic pursuits, Ancheta went on to attend Liceo de Manila, Escuela de Pintura, Escultura y Grabado (the National School of Painting, Sculpture and Engraving), and the Acadamia de Dibujo y Pintura, which was the country's first state-supported school for painting and drawing, quite newly opened by Teodoro Buenaventura at the time. In the end, it was the Philippine Normal School that won his professional interest, where he would serve as a professor from 1918 until 1926.
As a landscape painter, Ancheta is known for hard lines and a dark, though realistic, pallette. A recurring theme in his work was fishing and seashore scenes, and he most commonly worked with oils on wood or canvas board. The same year he finished his bachelor degree, Ancheta participated in the Universal Exposition in St. Louis, Missouri, US (Philippine Section, 1904). He exhibited eight paintings, one of which, “A Victim of War”, received an Honorable Mention. He quickly built an audience of admirers, and his landscapes were soon hanging in classrooms across the Philippines. In 1941, his “Tienda del Barrio” also won an Honorable Mention at the National Art Competition of the University of Santo Tomas.
Ancheta kept good company in his painting, and was a known friend and contemporary of the artist Fernando Amorsolo, as well as artists Irineo Miranda, Dominador Castaneda, and Jose Pereira. This group of talented comrades would often travel and sketch together across rural areas and farmlands of Teresa, Marikina and Montalban. Ancheta’s and Amorsolo’s landscape scenes often echo each other from this time period.
Only in his early sixties, Isidro Ancheta passed away in 1946. His works continue to gain fame, notably making waves in 2014 and 2015 at Salcedo and León Gallery auctions.

Notable Works Include:

River Scene (1934)
Man on Carabao
Lavandera
A Victim of War
Tienda del Barrio
Women Washing Clothes (1910)
Guadalupe Ruin
Intramuros (1930)
Philippine Landscape (1936)
Sa Dalampasigan 1 & Sa Dalampasigan 2
Reclining Woman (1910)
Riverscape
Planting Rice (1932)

Excellent condition