By Jose Paolo S. dela Cruz
We bid on them. We hang them on our walls. We hold on to them as prized possessions. But as we all know there is more to these great artifacts than the beauty they bring to our homes.
This cannot be any more apparent than in Leon Gallery’s Spectacular Mid-Year Auction, which is happening on June 9, Saturday at the gallery’s Eurovilla 1 Showrooms in Makati. Here are some stories – rumors or otherwise – that you might just unearth from these exquisite lots.
Whatever happened to Andres Bonifacio?
In a rare handwritten document, the famed revolutionary’s widow, Gregoria de Jesus, chronicled the final days of Andres Bonifacio, before he was unceremoniously executed in the mountains of Maragondon, Cavite. Curator Lisa Guerrero Nakpil shared how in the journals, De Jesus recalled a soldier returning the blankets, clothes and medicines she had packed for her husband and his brother, Procopio, before they were arrested.
“When she asked why he had them, she was instructed to give the items to Bonifacio and his brother herself, and that they left the two in a house of a ‘teniente’ in the mountains,” shares Lisa in the vernacular. De Jesus searched the mountains until she found the teniente, who then convinced her to search further in another mountain. She did so for weeks, living off only on water from forest vines, before finally calling it off and accepting her husband’s fate.
Also part of the lot is a dagger bearing the markings of the Katipunan.
A rare photograph of De Jesus (dedicated to Jose P. Santos), who was also known as the Lakambini of the KKK, is also on auction, as well as a letter to Emilio Jacinto. In it, she pleaded for help for their mother – who, from being a wealthy woman, had been reduced to cleaning water tanks in their home town due to their attachment to the revolution. “She signs it, not as Gregoria de Jesus, but Gregoria de Bonifacio, which is a rare occasion,” stressed Nakpil.
Rumblings of the Rizals
The women behind the most fascinating heroes in Philippine history surely make a scene in this auction lot. Also going under the hammer is a lot of documents including court documents of the suit brought against Dr. Jose Rizal and his mother Teodora Alonso and her brother. In the letter, Alonso reiterates how unjustly persecuted she was, which in turn, influenced Rizal’s nationalism. Along with the documents are a Rizal family recipe.
Historian Martin Tinio Jr., who was also present during the event, shared some trivia about the Rizal women, who seemed to be of the catty kind. “The Rizal women have very strong personalities. They would not talk to each other directly and direct their servants to speak for them instead, even if they were just seated beside each other. They’re the type to say, ‘Pakisabi sa señora mo… (please tell your mistress)…’” he narrates in Filipino.
Not to be totally outdone by the women, Jose Rizal is also featured in the auction with a woodwork he completed while he was exiled in Dapitan.
The greater ‘troublemaker’
Nakpil also shares a letter by the great propagandist Marcelo H. del Pilar. The letter, addressed to his wife while he was struggling as a writer in Madrid, chronicled how he had to stoop so low, as to pick cigarette butts off the streets to take a drag.
Del Pilar, unlike Rizal, wrote in Filipino and was a good strategist with a wide mass base. According to Nakpil, he was seen by the Spanish as the “greater threat.” This is because he speaks the language of the people. “He is probably the equivalent of a social media influencer back in the day,” she says.
Heroes and letters aside, the Spectacular Mid-Year Auction also features works by Lorenzo Guerrero of life along the Pasig River, an ornate Tampinco Chair (which has been proving lucrative for those who own one), as well as works from Zobel, Joya, Zalameda, Amorsolo and more.
Catch these stories and more before hammer goes down on June 9!
