[Because of the international dimension, items regarding Lee Man Fong are written in English]

Lee Man Fong (1913-1987) was a Chinese painter who made a large part of his work in Indonesia. Interesting is that he obtained a so-called Malino scholarship. Remarkable in the sense that he was already much older than most students (34 when he obtained the scholarship in 1946) and because he was not Indonesian or Dutch. It is said that the Dutch viceroy Van Mook was instrumental in awarding him the Malino scholarship, although it is not clear what the role of the viceroy was. There is also information that LMF made a portrait for Van Mook, but it is not clear if that was from the viceroy himself or from his wife.

When I obtained a copy of ‘The oil paintings of Lee Man Fong’, I came across several portraits. ^{1 2} Maybe they are in the style of the portraits LMF made for the viceroy. Some of these were already painted in 1940. During that period, LMF participated in his first exhibitions and received his first recognition. Maybe it was due to this recognition that he made the portraits.

Two of these portraits were of Miss. P and Mrs. P. Probably mother and daughter. They are clearly of Dutch descent.
Who might they be?

1. See my blog: Lee Man Fong 2014 boek – “Met een Malinobeurs naar Nederland” ↩︎
2. Lee, M.F. (2014). The oil paintings of Lee Man Fong : the pioneer artist of Indonesia and Singapore = Li Manfeng huaji. (Second edition). Art Book. ↩︎ ↩︎