The Art of Collecting

The Art of Collecting East Indies paintings Artists such as painters and photographers were

East Indies paintings

fascinated by the tropical landscapes, picturesque villages and markets and especially the diverse inhabitants of the Dutch East Indies. In the first half of the 20th century a large group of European artists, who were also called Beautiful Indies painters, worked there.

Today the qualities of these East Indies paintings are fully recognized.

Private collectors played and important pioneering role here. With the exceptional Colauto-Van Peperstraten collection as the central focus, the book describes how a few pioneers were each touched in their own way by the East Indies paintings and built up a collection. This is how they also became experts in a field that was only recognized as important by museums and auctioneering firms at a later stage. Their personal view of the art world.

Full attention is also given to the interest in this art movement in postwar Indonesia, with pioneering collectors such as President Sukarno and Vice-President Malik, as well as to the current collectors.

ISBN: 978 94 6022 5123

9 789460 225123 >

– East Indies paintings

stories and many anecdotes give a fascinating inside

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The Art of Collecting East Indies paintings

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East Indies paintings

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COLOPHON

LM Publishers Parallelweg 37 1131 DM Volendam info@lmpublishers.nl www.lmpublishers.nl © 2019 – LM Publishers Editor: Bea Brommer Design: MaxZ – Tjeu Ziellemans Translation: ABC Translations Production: High Trade BV ISBN 978 94 6022 512 3 This book was published on the occasion of the exhibition Indisch Palet in the Westfries Museum, Hoorn. (westfriesmuseum.info) Front cover: Isaac Israëls: Javanese Man and Horse (detail).

Back cover: Willem Hofker: Ni Sadri, Bali - Legong Dancer (detail).

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The Art of Collecting East Indies paintings 4

Colophon

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Preface Ad Geerdink, Director Westfries Museum

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Introduction Koos van Brakel

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1

The Spark Bea Brommer

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The relationship between an Art-dealer – Artist – Collector Evert J.M. Douwes VII

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Traveling with paintings Ruud Spruit

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The East Indies paintings collection of the Tropenmuseum Koos van Brakel

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Indonesian Collectors Bruce Carpenter

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List of exhibitions

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Select bibliography

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Biographical notes on the artists

196

List of illustrations

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PREFACE Ad Geerdink, Director Westfries Museum

This is a book about the passion for collecting.

The collection of art to be exact. The book title suggests that this is an art in itself and there is a strong case to be made for that.

Because not only the artist but also the art collector creates something new. Something that was not there yet before. And for a major part the collector does that with the same set of talents: passion, skills, knowledge and creativity.

Museums are accustomed to produce catalogues and books on their collections.

It is their task to share with the public the knowledge of our common cultural heritage.

For private collectors this is less evident. Some collectors however are willing to publish the art works they have been collecting. It was more than twenty-five years ago that a selection of the Colauto-Van Peperstraten collection was made public in the beautiful volume Indonesische Impressies/Indonesian Impressions, researched and written by Ruud Spruit, then director of the Westfries Museum, Hoorn. It accompanied exhibitions in Hoorn and Helmond in the Netherlands followed by similar shows in Jakarta and Surabaya, Indonesia.

Fig. 1, p. 6:

The aim of this new volume is not only to show the fascinating evolution of their collection through the last twenty-five years by depicting art works they once possessed and the ones they were able to acquire in more recent years. This time we also hear their personal stories that are linked to these works thus sharing their adventures, their dedication, their emotions and their joy.

Rob Colauto and Yvonne van Peperstraten are giving full credit to the Dutch pioneer collectors of East Indies paintings Pieter and Ina van Donk. They got to know each other well and met both socially and in the auction rooms as they did with collector Jan van Vliet.

Their stories are all interwoven.

Others contributed to this book. They know Rob and Yvonne well and have worked with them in different capacities. All were immediately prepared to cooperate, each writing from his own perspective. Evert Douwes found time in his overloaded schedule to shed light on the interesting interaction between art dealer, artist and collector. Ruud Spruit takes us on an interesting trip to some artistst and collectors he met during his work. Koos van Brakel discusses the building up of the collection of East Indies paintings in the Tropenmuseum, Amsterdam. Bruce Carpenter describes the world of Indonesian collectors, a little known but fascinating subject.

Dennis A-Tjak graciously made photographs of a number of paintings, free of charge. Arno Verkade, director of Christie’s, has done his utmost to unearth photographs of works that passed their auction halls years ago, as did Albertine Verlinde, director of Sotheby’s.

We wish to express our sincere gratitude to all of them.

Pieter Ouborg, Portrait of a woman.

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INTRODUCTION Koos van Brakel

In this volume the subject is collecting East Indies paintings, broadly comprising works made in the Dutch East Indies in the first half of the twentieth century. Most of the artists were Europeans. Some worked as art teacher in schools, others were attracted by tales of Bali as a paradisiacal island. Their art is generally designated as painted in the Mooi Indië or Beautiful Indies style. The name is probably derived from the name of a portfolio with twelve colored plates of watercolors painted by F.J. van Rossum du Chattel which was published in 1913 with the title Mooi Indië.

Afbeeldingen in kleuren van twaalf aquarellen [Beautiful Indies. Representations in color of twelve watercolor paintings]. These prints were very popular and adorned the walls of many households in the East Indies. Beautiful Indies art equals romance, rice paddies, mountains, palm trees and ‘native huts’, under a yellow, purple and red sky.

This description applies to the paintings of the majority of the artists working in the Dutch East Indies, European and Indonesian.

A small group of artists does not paint in this genre: painters like Walter Spies, Isaac Israëls, Charles Sayers, Dolf Breetvelt, Willem

Dooijewaard – this enumeration is not intended to be complete. However, it cannot be denied that most of them presented an idealized and idyllic image of the colony. They were not influenced by the many -isms in painting in the first half of the twentieth century. They worked in a realistic style and usually chose landscapes, dances, ceremonies, markets, cockfights and street scenes as their subject. Both the conservative buyers and the art critics were against modern development and advocated the Beautiful Indies style.

Revaluation of paintings of the Dutch East Indies began in the 1990’s.

In the Netherlands only a few people collect East Indies paintings. Most of the demand for this type of art comes from wealthy collectors in Asia and Indonesia, who sometimes also establish their own museums. The work they collect is almost exclusively by painters from the twentieth century. Perhaps the seventeenth to nineteenth century paintings are too strongly linked to colonial history. For quite some time now top prices are being paid for masterpieces. Not exactly prices Dutch collectors or museums can afford to pay for these paintings.

Fig. 2, p. 8: Johannes ten Klooster, Dancers, c.1922.

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1.

THE SPARK Bea Brommer

PIONEER COLLECTORS IN THE NETHERLANDS

his collection, made by a living artist. Thus Suwandani could fill the gaps in his collection.

Why do we want to buy a painting or an art object? What triggers our interest and how do we get hooked? Difficult to define, as each of us has a different story to tell. Apart from the purely financial aspect, collecting is about our emotions and inner feelings. Not surprisingly a first acquisition is more often than not the result of an unexpected event.

”The moment we stepped over the threshold I was struck by a drawing hanging on the wall.

I seemed to recognize the sleeping boy on the road in Bali. As it turned out it had been made by Rudolf Bonnet. That was the spark for us and we were delighted to be allowed to acquire it”.

One year later Pieter and Ina had the opportunity to buy another Bonnet, the Poera Dalem, from the estate of the late Anton (Bob) Mörzer Bruyns, honorary Dutch consul in Bandung. These two works formed the foundation of a remarkable collection.

Pieter en Ina van Donk

Fig. 3, p. 10:

Pieter and Ina van Donk are Dutch pioneers in the field of collecting East Indies paintings.

Pieter’s career in the Dutch Foreign Office took them to various countries like the US and Canada, Guyana and, most important of all, to Indonesia. It was here that their first acquisition was made. ”Actually it was my fault,“ Ina van Donk says with a smile. ”I was watching a temple procession that slowly wound its way through Sanur in Bali. All of a sudden I saw a boy lying asleep on the side of the street, in the middle of the crowd of participants and onlookers.

With awe I observed how every single person quietly stepped over him while the procession advanced through the streets”.

This happened in June 1976 and not long after that experience Ina and Pieter were invited by Suwandani, an eminent Chinese surgeon in Jakarta. He turned out to be the owner of an impressive collection of paintings and Chinese porcelain. They were told that President Sukarno used to visit him twice a year and each time bought a painting from

What followed was a growing interest in the artist Rudolf Bonnet and a deepening appreciation for his work. They chose to focus on this artist and through the years they were able to build up an impressive collection of forty-five paintings depicting Dutch East India.

This was at a time when East Indies paintings were barely appreciated and the European artists who had lived and worked in the East Indies were practically unknown to the Dutch public. Consequently prices were low and Pieter and Ina were able to pick up excellent pieces for reasonable prices.

At the time tracing art works consisted mainly of spelling out the small ads in Dutch papers and various leaflets and publications intended for the community that had migrated to the Netherlands after World War II and the subsequent independence of Indonesia.

Those who had been able to bring some of

H.A.L. Wichers, Temple procession.

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Fig. 4: Rudolf Bonnet, Sleeping man, Oeboed, Bali.

Fig. 5: Rudolf Bonnet, Poera Dalem, 1947.

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their belongings often possessed paintings that depicted their former homeland. In Dutch periodicals like Tong Tong this aging generation or their heirs could offer them for sale and reach the specific public that appreciated the subjects and the style.

Bonnet used his servant Djemoel many times as a model. Once, when Pieter and Ina visited Bali they paid Djemoel a visit and they were told that Bonnet had bequeathed him a sum of money. He had very wisely invested it by building a house for himself.

After Pieter’s retirement in 1990 and their final return to the Netherlands the Van Donks were able to attend auctions more often. At that time prices had not yet skyrocketed, so when a good Bonnet was offered for sale, in most cases they could add it to their collection.

And then you grow older, prompting the question what to do with the collection. As Pieter formulated it, “Building up a collection is one thing but how do you get rid of it?”

Through the years choices were made to sell them one by one, difficult but necessary and sensible choices. They kept the ones dearest to them, like the sleeping boy.

Fig. 6: Rudolf Bonnet, Djemoel, Bali.

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Fig. 7: Pieter Ouburg, Masks.

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Jan van Vliet Quite by coincidence it was also Rudolf Bonnet who ignited the spark in Jan van Vliet. ”I was walking in the – then – Museum voor Volkenkunde in Rotterdam to see an exhibition on silks when I passed a small dark cabinet.

Looking in, I was struck by what I saw. It was an exhibition with paintings Bonnet had made

when he lived in Bali. I had never heard of this artist nor of East Indies paintings for that matter”.

It sparked his interest in this art style and the subject. Goldsmith by training and art lover and collector by nature, he started looking for paintings. His very first acquisition of 1991 is still in his possession although the quality is

Fig. 8: Leaflet of the exhibition Bonnet op Bali, 1990.

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Fig. 9: Henry van Velthuysen, Girls with rice baskets.

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questionable. He found it at the Venduehuis in The Hague. “But” he says: “it still brings a smile to my face. Even after I discovered that it was made after a photograph”.

After this cheerful start the next step was years of study, visiting auctions and the handful of exhibitions that were organized in those years.

This allowed him to develop his insight and knowledge. What fascinates him is the meeting and at times confluence of the two cultures. Over the years his taste and focus evolved towards a clear preference for modernists like the well-known Pieter Ouborg and Jan Frank.

During his search for paintings he chanced upon a small black-and-white illustration in the Lexicon of foreign artists by Haks & Maris, described as An Indonesian woman and painted by Anna Blaupot ten Cate. It was part of the stock of the Frank Gallery in Jakarta.

Inquiring about its whereabouts he was told that the painting was still for sale. He seized this opportunity and said he wanted to buy it.

The owner of the gallery brought it with him when he visited the Netherlands and it proved to be a fascinating portrait.

The decision not to collect specific items was also deliberate. Woodcuts by Johannes ten Klooster, for example. “You don’t pay much for each one, but as he made hundreds of them you end up spending a fortune.”

Fig. 10: Balinese girl with rice basket. (Photo).

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Fig. 11: Anna Blaupot ten Cate, Indisch meisje. [Indonesian girl].

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Fig. 12: Masked dancers, Java, 19th century.

Fig. 13: Inscriptions on the back of the frame of ďŹ g.11, page 18.

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Fig. 14: Jan Frank, View in Batavia.

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Another example of the role of fate in building up a collection is this acquisition of Jan Frank’s townscape with palm trees and boats. ”Every painting has a story. It was about one-andhalf years ago that I visited a man who offered for sale a collection of 19th century photographs of the Dutch East Indies, my other passion. During our conversation I gathered that he was liquidating an estate and had brought various objects to an auction house, including Chinese porcelain and paintings. When he told me about their estimates I was shocked. Far too low.

Apparently the auctioneers had no knowledge at all about what they would be selling.

The items to be auctioned included this painting

by Jan Frank and the estimate was € 500! As all this had happened quite recently and the auction house had not yet registered the objects I felt free to make him an offer. Fortunately he agreed and took back the painting. He even brought it to my home”.

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Fig. 15: Isaac IsraĂŤls, Rebab player, Solo, 1922.

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Rob Colauto and Yvonne van Peperstraten Collecting East Indies paintings since the 1980s, Yvonne and Rob have created one of the most important private collections in the Netherlands. By a quirk of fate their interest was sparked via a fashion designer.

Yvonne, an independent accountant, assisted a small circle of less affluent friends with their accounts. Among them were Fedorine Smit-Schulze, a fashion designer and her brother Hugo who ran a small shop. They had an Indonesian background and for many of her creations Fedorine ordered special textiles from Indonesia. In 1980 Hugo was looking for a new activity. He decided to try his luck in Bali, where a growing interest and appreciation for East Indies paintings was creating a promising market. An uncle in the Netherlands could provide paintings that were very much sought after by art galleries in Bali.

Hugo also knew that Yvonne and Rob were interested and knowledgeable about art and had a taste for collecting. So when Rob visited Hugo in Bali in 1985 he was asked whether he and Yvonne could do some scouting for him in the Netherlands, visit auctions and buy paintings for him. They agreed to this new adventure, to take the plunge but first they had to do a lot of research on this completely new subject. At the time documentation was scarce, consisting of only a handful of relevant publications: the catalogue of the Sukarno collection, Verlaat Rapport Indië [Belated

Report Dutch East Indies], by Jeanne de Loos-Haaxman, published in 1968 and the exhibition catalogue Nederlandse schilders en tekenaars in de Oost [Dutch painters and artists in the Dutch East Indies] by her daughter Jeanne Terwen-de Loos of 1972.

Apart from these, a number of scattered articles described the life and work of particular artists.

They had their first opportunity in 1986 at an auction by Christie’s in Amsterdam. A mixed collection of odd bits and pieces that included some East Indies paintings was put up for sale.

Other acquisitions followed and Rob and Yvonne were able to buy an important collection for Hugo. To this could be added the private collection Guus Maris wanted to sell and which included a number of magnificent pieces.

So all was ready for Hugo to come over from Bali and collect the paintings they had and to have a look at the Maris collection.

Tragically, Hugo died suddenly in February 1988 and his sister had no interest in taking over his business. So a collection of East Indies paintings, payment advanced by Rob and Yvonne, was left. Through their endeavors for Hugo and their research on the subject, they had gradually become fascinated by this new art field that was still to be explored. In the end they decided not to sell the paintings they had bought for Hugo but to keep them themselves. This was the origin of their present collection.

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Fig. 17: Dolf Breetvelt, Men in the Pelabuhan, 1926.

Building up a collection

Fig. 16, p. 24: Dolf Breetvelt, Two women in a Balinese gate.

In the early days it was a matter of trial and error, very little documentation was available on the subject, and the artists themselves could not be consulted anymore. The few auctions at which East Indies paintings were offered for sale were usually attended by the handful of early collectors and they got to know each other. Bidding against each other was avoided if possible, but this was not always the case. Jan van Vliet remembers sitting in the back of a large auction hall, bidding for a painting and indeed getting it.

It was only afterwards that he realized that he had been bidding against Rob Colauto whom he had not seen as he was sitting somewhere in front. As Rob and Yvonne

recount: “When we met a fellow collector at an auction we tried to take each other’s preferences into account. It was a question of letting the other person have it”.

With prices reaching astronomical levels it became necessary to find the finances for new acquisitions. One solution was to invest in a painting that they could probably sell on for a much better price.

Copies and forgeries Once Rob Colauto was asked to look at a pastel drawing by Rudolf Bonnet. Because of its old and untouched frame, the owner was convinced that the drawing was authentic, but the moment Rob saw the Bonnet he started

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to laugh and said “I know the original”. When Yvonne came in, Rob showed her the drawing and said “I just bought this”. Yvonne’s reaction was immediate: “Have you lost your mind?”

This time the owner burst out laughing and said that her answer completely convinced him that it was a counterfeit. Baffling, however, was the fact that the frame was very old and

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untouched at the back. Closer inspection made everything clear. It was held by two tiny nails and by removing these the frame could be tipped up. An interesting trick to sell counterfeits.

There are more examples of counterfeit works, like the Bonnet that proved to be copied after a picture in the Sukarno

Fig. 18: Johannes Ten Klooster, Sameerah in the Sacred Grove, c. 1922.