Mixed legacy of Quincentennial in HOCUS exhibit

AS the 2021 celebration of the Quincentennial of the Victory at Mactan and related events is fast approaching, it is time to reflect on the implications of those events for us, which although showing the humanity of our ancestors in assisting the wary circumnavigators of the world, and the valor we showed when Magellan started meddling in our affairs, led to our colonization more than 40 years later in 1565. The “Cuadricula” exhibit by HoCus (for lawyer Saul Hofileña and painter Guy Custodio), curated by Gemma Cruz Araneta, that runs until March 15 (a day before the anniversary of Magellan’s arrival in Samar) at the Gallery 27 and 28 of the National Museum of Fine Arts, affords us a way to talk about that mixed legacy in a creative way.

During the open forum of my lecture on the HoCus exhibit last January 18, Ana Labrador, deputy director- general of the National Museum of the Philippines, stressed the importance of not just celebrating but also critiquing those events and their representations. She talked about how historians relied on the Boxer Codex for representations of our ancestors where in fact, it might be a romanticized version of them by their colonial masters in 1593.

Of course, in the absence of other images on the era, save for some drawings by the friars in their accounts, we can only rely on the Boxer Codex. But through art, Hofileña, with the help of Custodio, had the flexibility to reimagine our ancestors in a way that historians might be limited in doing, but still based on historical accounts and intelligent guesses.

Recently, in the wake of the animated movie “Elcano and Magellan, The First Voyage Around the World,” a Spanish scholar wrote an article in a local news source telling us that Ferdinand Magellan did not have a colonial agenda when he went to the Philippines and only wanted to trade. Filipino historians have challenged this by pointing to the fact that Magellan had a contract with Spain’s

for a share of whatever riches the expedition could get for Spain along the way, and that they actually planted crosses in places where they planned to return. In HoCus, the painting “Staking Territory” reminds us of that. It depicts a Mass held by the Dominicans on March 13, 1620 to claim the province of Benguet for the Dominicans. Hocus wonders about the site of the Easter Sunday Mass of 1521, and if it was celebrated with the same intent.

The HoCus exhibit underscores the fact that more than the Sword, it is the Cross that ultimately became the more effective weapon in colonizing us. It was not so much about force than the implantation of an idea — Spain gave us God that is why Spain is our only hope. The painting “The Colonization of the Mind” looks like an innocent painting of the places in Palestine like Bethlehem and Jerusalem around rosary beads, symbolizing how we were taught the life of Christ through the rosary. But at the tip of the rosary, an is enchained to the cross, dreaming of places in the Holy Land he will never ever visit.

Although Christianity is not bad in itself, those who implemented it in this country persecuted those who wouldn’t accept the new order. In the painting “The Philippine Palimpsest,” referring to the medieval practice of erasing texts on animal parchment, albeit not completely, we see a depiction of the crucifix with the Tagalog words for Hail Mary, written in red blood symbolizing the bloody conquest, but revealed at the back the words in Spanish, reminding us that it is a foreign religion.

But it can also be argued that we actually appropriated Christianity and saw it from the local viewpoint. The Bohol stations of the cross comes to mind where the Chocolate Hills were depicted. In the characters are depicted in local garb, and the Roman soldiers in Moriones costumes. Isn’t it that the historian Reynaldo Ileto articulated that the death and resurrection of Jesus became the inspiration of revolutionaries to also hope for the to also rise up and regain its freedom?

During the start of the 500-day countdown to the Quincentennial last December 14, there was a moment envisioned for quite some time by Ian Christopher Alfonso of the National Quincentennial committee secretariat, that there would be a lighting up of 21 important landmarks before 6 p.m. symbolizing 21 most important events in our struggle for nationhood. Coincidentally, a Hocus painting with a similar theme is “Time is…Time Was…Time’s Past” featuring a number of historical events illustrated by groups in each clock.

is the time keeper, the clock above her tells of Jose Rizal’s birth, his novels and his death. She is seen sewing the Philippine flag. Through these events, the nation was born!