Category: Politics
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Antonio Garcia Llamas (1912–1999)
Antonio Garcia y Llamas (1912–1999) was a Filipino painter, muralist, and teacher who worked between Manila, Jakarta, and Madrid. Little is written about Garcia but his work aligns with the Philippine academic tradition in twentieth-century Philippine painting. He was born in Manila on 16 May 1912 and received his early education at the Colegio de…
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EXPOLIARIVM: The Expatriate life of Juan Luna’s famous painting
In 1884, at the Madrid Exposición General de Bellas Artes, a photograph by Juan Laurent captured Juan Luna’s Spoliarium installed alongside other works exhibited within a cavernous steel and glass hall. The image preserves the exhibitionary context that contributed to consolidating the painting’s public and international reputation. While scanning the Biblioteca Nacional de España’s archive,…
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The Teacher Who Became a Mountain: Fernando Poe Jr.’s Asedillo (1971)
When Asedillo premiered in 1971, Ferdinand Marcos was tightening his grip on the republic, and the air in Manila was thick with student marches, labor strikes, and the metallic aftertaste of tear gas. Celso Ad. Castillo’s film—produced by and starring Fernando Poe Jr.—could have been mistaken for another action vehicle designed to confirm FPJ’s legend…
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Malcañang Museum Mania
In the narrative of the Marcos family’s return to prominence, museums are regarded as having a lesser impact compared to other institutions. Enthusiasts of history acknowledge the long-standing involvement of the Marcos family in establishing and managing museums. Bongbong Marcos harbored aspirations of becoming an artist in his youth, a fact highlighted by a tour…
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The Kingdoms of Israel and Ophir
and the power of a fabricated diplomatic history And they came to Ophir, and fetched from thence gold, four hundred and twenty talents, and brought it to King Solomon. — I Kings 9:28. On July 30th of this year (2023), a most bizarre headline appeared in one of the leading news publications in the…
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Grupos Filipinos Ilustres, 1911
Photo: Grupos Filipinos Ilustres, NCCA/ National Museum Collection This lithograph called Grupos Filipinos Ilustres by Guillermo Tolentino from 1911, created the National Pantheon according to historian Resil Mojares. It imagined heroes, intellectuals, artists, activists and politicians together in a studio portrait. It was a popular fixture in homes during the American occupation of the Philippines,…
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From the Secret Files of American History
A response to Black Reconstruction in America (1935) by W.E.B Du Bois There are significant parallels between the events following the American Civil War and our current political situation. Does this mean that history is repeating itself in some momentous way or is it just a case of the same old shit happening all along?…
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Brief notes on Teddy Roosevelt’s statue being removed from the steps of the Museum of Natural History
In the New York Times today: the equestrian statue of Theodore Roosevelt, the former president of the United States who declared the end of the Philippine-American War in 1902, will be removed from the steps of the Museum of Natural History. The Museum maintains that it is removing the statue not because of Theodore Roosevelt’s…
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Dog cage quarantine
An officer of the neighborhood night-watch with five young men locked inside a dog cage after breaking community quarantine rules in Laguna province, the Philippines on March 20, 2020 (Eric Panisan Ambrocio via Facebook/Human Rights Watch) When my sister told me not to make plans to come home to the Philippines over the…
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The Great Cosmic Detour
On the writings of Kidlat Tahimik When Kidlat Tahimik was named as one of the recipients of the Prince Claus Awards in 2018, I felt two contradictory reactions when I was asked to write a short biographical note about him for the Nikkei Asian Review. On one hand, for a filmmaker who has produced mostly…
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A New Prince Must Rise
Review of Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s ‘Assembly’ It’s all a question of assembly: Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri know how really productive work can break the common good. Yes, they did it again: after “Empire”, “Multitude” and “Common Wealth”, now comes “Assembly”, the latest delivery in the series of subversive feel-good books from H…
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Leni Robredo in Alabang
Before beginning my article on hoaxes and the propaganda machine, I would like to share this video: Leni Robredo gave a speech at Alabang Country Club last March 21, 2016. The vice-presidential candidate told how and why she arrived at the moment of deciding to run in the elections, first as a district representative and…
Geronimo Cristobal 