This year, CASA JUAN introduced its most extensive collection of dining and homeware collectibles, featuring select artworks by modernist painter Juvenal Sansó and selected from the private collection of the late artist’s estate Fundación Sansó. Each artwork was superimposed on a series of trays, diningware, chairs, and jewelry boxes. 

Of Profound Joy, Of Gentle Reminiscences, Of Bounteous Optimism, and With Gentle Exuberance were chosen because of their blissful and distinct visuals; Sansó made these during his happiest years.

The Filipino homeware brand has continuously highlighted Philippine culture, heritage, and creativity; created this collaboration not only to honor the life, work, and advocacy of a modernist master who, despite having been born in Reus, Spain, regards the Philippines as his true home.

Here, he set deep roots that would later shape a 70-year creative journey. His artistic exploration led him to paintings, prints, photography, textiles, and even costume design. In his early years after World War II, he dabbled in surrealism, creating images of death and destruction in pure monochrome. This era was known as the “Black Period.” 

By the mid-20th century, Sansó began to incorporate color and other vibrant elements into his work. His Moderno series revisited “vistas and landscapes he had seen in the past or places he had traveled to.” Bold colors and compositions distinguished his imagery. In Breton Houses, Sansó immortalizes Brittany from imagination and memory. Idyllic landscapes, as depicted in A Cerulean Daydream and Endearing Charm, are also showcased in the collection.

Sansó, who spent considerable time in Britanny, was known for immortalizing scenes from places he had visited.  Most of the artist’s images are drawn from a place between imagination and memory, and they also serve as reminders of a happy time. 

Flowers also make up an essential part of the Sanso oeuvre. In the 1950s, he painted bouquets floating in a vast void. He later presented manifold expressions through both painting and printmaking.

This resulted in the Bloom Series — a collective term for the artists’ works that showcase skulls adorned with flowers, earth-bound wildflowers, twilight flowers, foliar plants, orientalia, among others. No other Philippine artist has extracted as much from the humble flower as Sansó. His legacy in this subject lies in celebrating and elevating blooms in ways never imagined in the local art scene.

This vibrant collection served as visual metaphors for “the peace and tranquility he experiences during his stay in the north-western coast of France.” This series captures the essence of calm, warmth, and comfort, as experienced through the eyes of Sansó.