salivating over tawasils

i visited the gallery yesterday to view the Tawasil Retrospective. I am going there again today because i wasn't able to see things very well yesterday.

i can't afford tawasil anymore. there was a time, maybe around five years ago, when i still could. but not anymore. sigh.

as it was mainly a retrospective, he did not have a lot of new works for sale. on display were privately owned works like a portrait of the lola of a friend from high school, some of his architectural drafts, some early pen and inks, his first watercolor, his first oil. going around the gallery, you get a better idea of how he evolved his distinct technique, the wave-like thingies. and you could see that he really likes using muslim motifs in his paintings and even in the houses he designs. actually, he likes drawing muslims, period.

mae and trish of the gallery sent me yesterday pictures, dimensions, and prices of the five paintings being sold.

the first three is the Mora series.

this here is Mora 1.

and this is Mora 2

and this is Mora 3.

Mora 1, 2, and 3 are all so achingly beautiful. if i have to choose, i will stand firm and not. haha. purple-orange hair? orange-pink hair? brown-torquiose hair? and you probably do get tints like that when you are a mora who has to constantly stay under the sun, such as when you live on a boat. but aren't the paintings simply beautiful. i so think so.

they are all 18.5" by 23". framed. circa 2009. 35k each.

and this one here is of a mora too but the focus is on the fishes in the basket on her head. same size as the mora series. same price too. but is that green sphere on her basket a grenade? or a pouch for her money? and are the fishes actually bulad? it would seem so because you can see the bones.

and here is the classic holy family theme:

this last one is the most covetable of them all, in my opinion. it's huge, compared to the others (31" x 41.5") and pricier (70k). looking at this, one of the first thing i realize that the fishes in the vendor's basket in the earlier painting are fresh fishes in fact, and not bulad. because in this painting, you see a similar looking fish above the father. the fish is swimming in the water, ergo, it is fresh, even alive. unless the tribe of the family pictured here are into tying their dried salted fishes into the outriggers of their boats. to soften it perhaps?