Monday, October 19, 2026
News and Views from the Global South
/ARTS WEEKLY/PHILIPPINES: Row over Painting Leads to Stomach vs Soul Debate
Marites Sison
- Filipinos have found themselves confronted with the classic dilemma of whether a person should buy bread to feed one’s stomach or flowers to feed one’s soul.
Did a government agency – the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) – do the right thing by buying a 110-year-old painting of a foremost Filipino painter and historical figure at a Christie’s auction in Hong Kong last month for 46 million pesos (884,615 U.S dollars)?
The GSIS said its purchase of the painting by Juan Luna, also a key figure in the struggle against Spanish colonisation centuries ago, was meant to ”save a piece of Philippine history”. But politicians and other critics said the government agency had wasted the badly needed resources of this poor country by buying it.
The controversial oil painting shows a woman sitting in a Paris cafe against the backdrop of three men in a huddle – Luna, Philippine national hero Dr Jose Rizal and Ariston Bautista ¡ all of whom had spent years of exile in Europe while campaigning against Spain’s colonisation.
This South-east Asian country was a Spanish colony for some four centuries starting in the 16th century. Luna did the painting, ‘Parisian Life’, in 1892, four years before Rizal was executed by the Spaniards for rebelling against its rule and six years before a full-fledged armed revolution against Spain began.
”We are very happy that we are able to bring home this famous painting to its permanent residence,” GSIS chief Winston Garcia said at the unveiling of the painting at the GSIS Museum on Nov. 6.
But "you can’t eat a Luna," remarked a congressman who said the money used to buy the painting should have been used to feed the hungry in this country of 80 million people, 40 percent of whom live below the poverty line.
"True. It is easier to eat grass than to eat canvass. But sheep eat grass, and a nation is not sustained only by what it takes into its stomach,” argued columnist Amando Doronila. ”A nation also has a soul and it is this element that is sustained by culture and history."
In a piece in the English-language daily ‘Philippine Daily Inquirer’, Doronila argued: ”I think that when the national economy is depressed and when the political system has become a national embarrassment, the Filipino people look at two directions for salvation and redemption of their self-esteem.”
”Either they embrace populist but ignorant demagogues who promise the moon or seek solace form inspiring monuments of excellence in the arts. Where politics have failed us, culture, arts and literature have sustained us,” he pointed out.
Still others, while not necessarily opposed to the preservation of artistic heritage, have asked if it was right for the GSIS to use funds coming from contributions of government employees to acquire the Luna painting.
"I sympathise with the critics. But why waste taxpayers’ money for one painting? The employees could have had an increase in salary or benefits. Some teachers haven’t received their retirement benefits yet," wrote one student from the state-run University of the Philippines, who joined a cyber discussion on the issue.
The GSIS has argued that the money had come from its investment funds stemming from a healthy net income, and that it did not eat into funds for members in order to buy the Luna.
Its officials also said the agency wanted to buy the painting rather than see it go into the hands of foreigners, because ‘Parisian Life’ had been scheduled to be auctioned by Christie’s.
The controversy that accompanied the Luna painting at the auction pushed up its price from an original price of 14 million pesos (330,000 dollars).
Some critics also say that ‘Parisian Life’ was not even a Luna masterpiece. Luna is best known by Filipinos for ‘Spoliarium’, which depicted the struggle of Filipinos for national liberation and which won the gold medal of excellence in the 1884 Madrid salon exhibition.
‘Spoliarium’, once owned by the Spanish government, was returned to the Philippines as a gesture of goodwill and is now at the National Museum.
But regardless of what their views are over the purchase of the Luna painting, many agree that the row has underscored the need to do something about the country’s cultural legacy.
The return of the painting has "delivered a shock therapy that made Filipinos aware of the haemorrhage of national cultural treasures finding their way into foreign museums and collections of private art collectors," said Doronila.
"It is widely known in Philippine cultural circles that we have lost an incalculable number of our artifacts through the porous regulations that are supposed to control the exit of these treasures,” he added.
Even the story of how Luna’s ‘Parisian Life’ got out of the country remains sketchy. Newspaper reports have quoted the family that had owned the painting as saying that it had been taken from their ancestral home and sold without their knowledge to a foreign buyer, who in turn sold it to Christie’s.
”It is not enough to have a general law without the rules for its application, because confusion and chaos can ensue.What happens when the next Juan Luna goes on the market?” asked Maribel Ongpin, columnist for the English-language daily ‘Today’.
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/ARTS WEEKLY/PHILIPPINES: Row over Painting Leads to Stomach vs Soul Debate
Marites Sison
- Filipinos have found themselves confronted with the classic dilemma of whether a person should buy bread to feed one’s stomach or flowers to feed one’s soul.
(more…)
Print
|
/ARTS WEEKLY/PHILIPPINES: Row over Painting Leads to Stomach vs Soul Debate
Marites Sison
- Filipinos have found themselves confronted with the classic dilemma of whether a person should buy bread to feed one’s stomach or flowers to feed one’s soul.
(more…)
Print
|
