The lives and works of Raden Saleh and Juan Luna explored in exhibition

During the height of colonial rule in Southeast Asia in the 19th century, two young men from Indonesia and the Philippines sailed across the ocean to Europe, to train under great painters of their time. They steadily earned their place within European art worlds, and their successes there made them national heroes in their respective homelands. These two luminaries are the subject of the exhibition Between Worlds: Raden Saleh and Juan Luna at National Gallery Singapore. The exhibition unites, for the first time, an array of their masterpieces loaned from private and public collections around the world that traces their artistic journey from Southeast Asia to Europe and back again. It also tells of their struggle to reconcile their love of homeland with their ambitions in Europe, where they established their careers. Despite hailing from different countries and being active at different times of the 19th century, the artists sh