The Ten Lots at Leon Gallery’s Spectacular Mid-Year Auction to Bid For
Every major auction has its headliners, but the most compelling sales are often defined by the breadth of stories they tell. Leon Gallery’s Mid-Year Auction moves effortlessly between Philippine history, modernism, contemporary art, and decorative arts, offering collectors the chance to acquire everything from a rediscovered Anita Magsaysay-Ho and an early BenCab to one of the country’s rarest surviving historical documents and an extraordinary nineteenth-century Manila Aparador. These are the ten lots we would probably bid on ourselves.
Lot 30: Anita Magsaysay-Ho, Five Senses (1950)
Anita Magsaysay-Ho’s Five Senses is more than a rediscovered masterpiece—it marks the artist’s first major award and a pivotal moment in Philippine modernism. Unseen publicly for over 70 years, the painting won Second Prize at the landmark 1950 AAP competition that cemented the ascendancy of the modernists. Its rarity, historical importance, and impeccable provenanceProvenanceThe documented history of an object's ownership, origin, and authenticity, particularly important for classic cars, watches, art, and wine. Strong provenance can dramatically raise an item's value, and collectors andGo to Provenance Glossary make it one of the sale’s most significant works—and is surely on many a serious collector’s list.
Starting bid: Php16,000,000.
Lot 40: BenCab, Sabel Series (1967)
Few figures in Philippine art are as enduring as Sabel. This early 1967 example is particularly compelling for its restraint, stripping away the dramatic flourishes often associated with the series in favor of a more introspective portrait that reveals the emotional depth at the heart of BenCab’s enduring masterpiece.
Starting bid: Php1,800,000.
Lot 123: Karen Ocampo-Flores, Mark Justiniani, Joy Mallari, and Federico Sievert, Untitled
This untitled piece brings together Karen Ocampo-Flores, Mark Justiniani, Joy Mallari, and Federico Sievert in a rare 1996 collaborative painting that turns family into a dreamlike allegory. Floating over a midnight clock, an intertwined couple gathers symbols of birth, hope, and home: a rose, a womb, children, a distant house, and a glowing star. The result is a dense, lyrical meditation on time, creation, and intimacy.
Starting bid: Php1,400,000.
Lot 19: Jigger Cruz, “Give Me Some Bones”
Jigger Cruz’s “Give Me Some Bones” captures the artist’s furious dialogue with art history. Beneath its slashes, smears, and torn frame sits a buried classical image, reduced to a contested ground for Cruz’s “aggressive archaeology.” Paint becomes both weapon and excavation tool, disrupting the authority of Western painting while exposing its stubborn traces. The result is raw, layered, and defiantly alive.
Starting bid: Php2,700,000.
Lot 64: Manuel Ocampo, Untitled
Manuel Ocampo turns a central vase into a fractured field of symbols, blackened heads, angular lines, and unstable forms. The image feels ornamental at first, then increasingly disquieting, suggesting erasure, anonymity, and historical trauma. Through crude abstraction and deliberate visual chaos, Ocampo channels his long-running concerns with colonial memory, religion, identity, and the grotesque.
Starting bid: Php1,000,000.
Lot 50: Danilo Dalena, Ano Kamo?
Plucked from his Pakil Series, Danilo Dalena’s “Ano Kamo?” turns a familiar Pakil street scene into a sharp portrait of Filipino social life. Set outside the old stone church of St. Peter of Alcantara, the work captures two elderly men caught in a conspiratorial exchange: gossip, rumor, perhaps even fake news. With humor and bite, Dalena transforms idle talk into a modern parable on calumny, community, and national habit.
Starting bid: Php2,000,000.
Lot 21: Raffy Napay, Untitled
Raffy Napay’s 2016 work draws the viewer into a dense forest of paint, thread, and fabric, where foliage twists into a living web. At its center, a nest becomes both refuge and mystery: a fragile home suspended within the larger pulse of nature. Through layered greens, browns, reds, and blues, Napay turns the forest into a meditation on shelter and belonging.
Starting bid: Php500,000.
Lot 97: A Copy of the Malolos Constitution
One of the foundational documents of the Philippine nation, the Malolos Constitution established Asia’s first republican constitution and laid the framework for democratic government, civil rights, and the separation of church and state. Connected to the revolutionary congress convened by Emilio Aguinaldo in 1898, it’s one of the few surviving documents associated with the event and represents an extraordinary piece of Philippine political history.
Starting bid: Php500,000.
Lot 22: Manila Aparador (c. 1825–1850)
This gorgeous late-neoclassical Manila Aparador exemplifies the sophistication of early Filipino furniture-making. Executed in richly burled narra and kamagong with silver fittings and refined line inlay, it reflects influences ranging from French Empire and Louis XVI to German Biedermeier. Comparable examples are scarce, particularly with strong provenance, making this an important survivor from the homes of Manila’s nineteenth-century elite and one of those rare pieces that only a few possess.
Starting bid: Php1,000,000.
Lot 52: Fernando Amorsolo, Puerta Real de Bagumbayan (1938)
Painted during Fernando Amorsolo’s artistic prime, Puerta Real de Bagumbayan captures one of Intramuros’ most historic landmarks bathed in the artist’s signature sunlight. Created the same year he became acting director of the UP School of Fine Arts, it offers collectors both historical resonance and classic Amorsolo appeal—and steps away from subjects that include people in the vista, which makes it stand out among the other stunning Amorsolo lots.
Starting bid: Php1,400,000.
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