By Guillermo Ramos

Every day I drive to and from work along Roxas Boulevard. Respectful though I am toward the general order of things, I don’t really like what I see. I find the unbearable kitschness of the Sputnik-influenced light spectacle all too much for my aesthetic sensibilities. Bad enough that I have to endure the traffic whilst returning home, but that giant pop art-inspired Coca-Cola bottle along with the huge Styrofoam coffee cup, complete with their almost human figures, and the life-size cement dinosaurs, which remind our children of their Jurassic past are nothing but an anomaly and surely the crudest form of public art.

True, forward-thinking urban planning is imperative for a city to survive. It is also true that lighting the streets can deter crime. Don’t get me wrong; I fully commend [former] Mayor Lito Atienza’s efforts to develop the area, but why push the envelope so far as to have a plethora of lights that must surely be visible from outer space? And now, not to be outdone, we have Pasay City also wishing to bask in similar reflected glory by installing its own hideous diamond-shaped lamps, half of which are now out of action.

Roxas Boulevard offers so much art and a seemingly endless source of historical trivia wherever you look. The boulevard gracefully traverses in a crescentlike form along Manila Bay. From its southerly end, it commences at the tip of Coastal Road in Tambo, Parañaque, and terminates in the north at the Katigbak Drive on the edge of Rizal Park. Known in ancient times as Lagyo, a quiet seashore where the current western boundary of Malate/Ermita district stretches out, its reclamation began during the American Period when urban planning was high on the political agenda, and with that the shoreline was gradually altered to form its present geographical contour.

The crowning glory of the boulevard is the slightly faded Manila Hotel, widely known for its illustrious past, and once called home by General [Douglas] MacArthur during the war years. One of its suites, in fact, has been fittingly named in his honor. Built in 1912 in the tropical American style, the hotel nestles on three-and-a-half hectares of land on one of the earliest reclaimed areas of the boulevard.

Wanting to create a “new” architecture for the Philippines, the American government, during the early years of its benevolent assimilation, constructed several landmark buildings along Roxas Boulevard. These included the Army Navy Club, now converted into a museum, the Museo ng Maynila, and the Elks Club, which now houses the Museo Pambata, and the Quirino Grandstand, where military parades were reviewed and presidents of the republic took their oath of office. In the 1930s, the residence and offices of the American High Commissioner, now the American Embassy, were once termed “the most perfect on American soil.” Designed by an architect with no experience of life in the tropics, it resembles a federal prison rather than an embassy. It was built on a landfill, and the surrounding vegetation, once a mere collection of scraggly trees has now matured into majestic banyan trees.

Also worthy of note is the street-naming diversion of the government of that period. Before the reclamation of Manila Bay, the boulevard du jour that traverses the shoreline was named Harrison Boulevard, but was later renamed Dewey Boulevard as a fitting tribute to the hero of Manila Bay—Commodore [George] Dewey. As a result of some minor reclamation in 1912, a strip of dirt road from the edge of Bagumbayan to Baclaran was aptly called Cavite Boulevard, being as it was a natural access road connecting Manila to the province of Cavite. In 1915, following further massive development, Dewey Boulevard reverted to its former name of Harrison, and Cavite Boulevard gave way to the name of Dewey Boulevard.

During the Second World War, the Japanese occupants renamed it Heiwa Boulevard (Heiwa, in Japanese, ironically means “peace”). Due to the boulevard’s strategic location, with Bataan and Corregidor in its proximity, Kamikaze pilots used it as an airstrip, the backdrop for the most fearsome battle theater in recent memory. After the war, Dewey was rechristened Roxas Boulevard, in honor of the first president of the third Philippine Republic, Manuel A. Roxas.

In the midthirties, craggy boulders also known as breakwater topped the embankment of the boulevard. A promenade favored by lovers and families alike was used as ringside seats to history, as they watched the boats anchored in the bay. In 1571 the bay had been blackened by the burning palisades of Raja Sulayman’s wooden fort, while later it was to become the backdrop of the La Naval battles of 1646, marking the demise of Dutch ambitions on these shores. In 1762 the bay also witnessed the little-known invasion of the British. On a single day in May 1898, during one of the world’s most decisive naval battles, Commodore Dewey’s fleet sank the Spanish Admiral Montojo’s armada, while in the summer of 1942, one could again see the smoke of battle from across the bay that signalled Manila’s darkest hour . . . WWII.

With the advent of peace and continuing urban expansion, Roxas Boulevard saw the burgeoning growth of seaside mansion estates and beachfront bungalows. Its former glory can still be glimpsed on Roberts and Williams Streets along the service road of the boulevard. From the late ’50s through to the early ’70s, the boulevard was given the moniker “the strip,” exemplifying the prevailing lifestyle that reached its zenith in the 1960s. Being home to fashionable nightclubs like Bayside, and restaurants like D’ Aristocrat and Casa Marcos, it became the hippest place in Manila and competed with the premiere downtown street of the period, Avenida Rizal.

During the conjugal dictatorial reign of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos, high-rise hotels, condominiums, and office blocks such as the Magsaysay Center irreversibly altered the boulevard’s skyline. Thanks to their aggressive tourism ethos, Manila was soon propelled to the forefront as the destination of choice for international conventions and conferences. However, this also gave the Marcoses carte blanche with prime infrastructure projects, the most notable of which was the controversial Stonehill reclamation project on the edge of Roxas Boulevard, later to give rise to the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP).

The Cultural Center of the Philippines became a showcase or, for that matter, a veritable shoebox for the self-promotional ambitions of Imelda Marcos. Its uncanny shoebox shape may even have helped define the former First Lady’s sartorial preference. Dubbed as the “sanctuary of the Filipino soul,” it was designed by National Artist for Architecture Leandro Locsin. Built along the lines of the modern, international look of the ’60s, the edifice is made entirely of cold, gray reinforced concrete. Although windows are featured on the topmost floor on the western side of the building, it can nevertheless be anxiety-inducing due to its almost total windowless feature. It was inaugurated on September 8, 1969, with Senator and Mrs. Ronald Reagan as guests of honor. At the same time, the epic musical Dularawan opened a three-month-long festival.

The Cultural Center has been witness to the world’s best and brightest performing artists. Van Cliburn, Dame Margot Fontaine, the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra, and the Boston Opera Company were all feted by the Marcoses and the glitterati of Manila, and it soon became the Southeast Asian showcase for the best that Western art could offer. The years after the EDSA revolution of 1986, however, saw the Cultural Center moving closer to its grassroots by featuring more homegrown talent and productions. A veritable witchhunt soon ensued and anything considered Imeldific was treated with suspicion and disdain.

Twenty years on, and following several leaderships, the CCP still stands as the nurturing force that promotes the Filipino aesthetic, national identity, and artistic excellence, while striving to create cultural values toward a humanistic global society. The current management is implementing a business and master development plan that is poised to make the CCP a mecca for arts and culture in Asia. Resident companies representing dance, music, and theater offer regular performing seasons at affordable ticket prices. There are four resident dance companies: Ballet Philippines, Philippine Ballet Theater, the Ramon Obusan Folkloric Group, and the Bayanihan Philippine National Folk Dance Company. Tanghalang Pilipino is the resident theater company, featuring original Filipino plays and translated classics, while music is represented by the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra, the UST Symphony Orchestra, the Philippine Madrigal Singers, and the National Music Competitions for Young Artists Foundation. Recently, the CCP once again hosted its annual Pasinaya festival, a daylong smorgasbord of art and culture, featuring free sneak previews of the resident companies’ forthcoming season.

CCP also houses the best museum and art galleries in the country. Bulwagang Juan Luna is the main gallery where thematic exhibitions are held. It is named after one of the greatest Filipino artists and personalities of the Philippine Revolution, Juan Luna, whose most famous work is the majestic Spoliarium. Organized by Art Sentral Manila and Art Sentral Asia. This summer, Bulwagang Juan Luna will feature “Through the Palettes’ Eye,” a cornucopia of paitings on palettes by contemporary Filipino visual artists, from the collection of Rico and Melanie Hizon.

Bulwagang Fernando Amorsolo or the Small Gallery was named after Fernando Amorsolo, National Artist in Painting, who popularized the image of the beautiful and modest dalagang Filipina, bucolic landscapes, and rural norms and festivals. The gallery highlights experimental works by contemporary artists.

A virtual stone’s throw away from the CCP is the Star City Complex. A theme park right in the city center, it also functions as the headquarters of the Elizalde family’s business enterprise. Within this complex one can find the studios of the Manila Broadcasting Company (MBC) and DZRH, one of the first radio stations in the country. It is from here that the venerable Tia Dely Magpayo, the “First Lady of Philippine Broadcasting,” continues to broadcast her daily evening show, “Ito Ang Inyong Tiya Dely.”

One cannot help but notice the station’s radio tower, which for some inexplicable reason has been transformed to resemble a giant Santa Claus, and considered by various style police and heritage conservation advocacy groups as yet another eyesore on Roxas Boulevard.

Also within this overtly commercial complex lies one gem in the form of Aliw Theater, the home of Ballet Manila. Founded twelve years ago by the late Eric V. Cruz and prima ballerina Lisa Macuja-Elizalde, Ballet Manila has grown into one of the most creative and respected classic ballet companies in the country. The young company had a vision to introduce classical ballet to the masses by performing in malls, basketball courts, and other nontraditional venues throughout the country. Their sheer determination and hard work has paid off and a growing subscriber base enjoys a regular theater season offering four to six full-length ballet productions annually. Apart from this, visitors to the theme park are also offered regular free shows held at the complex’s smaller Star Theater.

Having trained at the Leningrad Choreographic School in St. Petersburg, Russia, and later becoming principal ballerina with the Kirov Ballet Company, Lisa Macuja-Elizalde returned home to the Philippines in 1986 to share her expertise by mentoring hundreds of aspiring ballerinas. Within the Aliw Theater complex is the Ballet Manila School where students are trained to the same Russian standard attained by Lisa. She regularly invites her former Russian teachers Serguei Vikolov and Tatiana Udalenkova to conduct master classes and to stage full-length ballets. Among its many productions, Ballet Manila has staged the Nutcracker, Giselle, Don Quixote, and La Bayadere. Most recently, its Romeo and Juliet was received with critical acclaim. To experience ballet in its purest form, a trip to the Aliw Theater is a must.

Diagonally across from the CCP sits the Metropolitan Museum of Manila, established in 1976. Its architecture reflects the CCP’s boxlike style. The Met was originally conceived as a museum for foreign art seeking to increase the Filipinos’ awareness of the cultures of the world by providing them the opportunity to view it in its original form. More than 100 exhibitions of non-Philippine art have been held at the museum, among them works by Pablo Picasso, Paul Klee, and Walter Gropius. Ten years after its inception, the Met expanded to include Philippine art in a groundbreaking bilingual approach. For the first time, publications, exhibition notes, invitations, labels, signs, and posters were formatted in both Filipino and English.

The Basement Gallery houses a permanent exhibit of classical Philippine gold work and pottery of the eighth to the thirteenth centuries and is well worth a visit. Featured here are gold adornments, ritual practices, and barter rings—evidence of a flourishing precolonial Filipino society actively engaged in local and international trade.

Monuments are a fundamental part of Roxas Boulevard, the most famous being that of national hero, Dr. Jose Rizal. Not just a symbol of Philippine patriotism, where visiting dignitaries lay the customary wreath, the Rizal monument also functions as the “zero” kilometer marker where the distance from Manila to any point in the country is measured. The monument is guarded 24 hours a day, seven days a week by soldiers from the Philippine Marine Corps. Rizal’s famous poem, “Mi Ultimo Adios” (My Last Farewell), allegedly written on the eve of his execution, is inscribed on the memorial plaque. Long considered among the most famous landmarks in the country, the bronze and granite monument was designed by Swiss sculptor Richard Kissling.

Controversy surrounded the building of the monument due to the fact that Kissling was only the second placer in the international monument design competition held between 1905 and 1907. The first-prize winner was Professor Carlos Nicoli of Carrara, Italy. His scaled plaster model, “To the Martyr of Bagumbayan,” bested 40 other entries. Among his plans were the use of Carrara marble from Italy and the incorporation of more elaborate figurative elements. Kissling’s model, on the other hand, was lambasted in the local press, satirized in a cartoon, and called vulgar. The all-American awards jury, none of whom were artists, architects, or engineers, was headed by the then Governor General James F. Smith.

Another controversy ensued when, during the hero’s birth centenary year of 1961, a stainless steel shaft was superimposed over the granite obelisk of the monument to increase its height from 12.7 meters to 30.5 meters. The project, undertaken by the Jose Rizal National Centennial Commission, was doomed from the very start, as the design resembled a futuristic rocket ship about to take off. Many found the shiny steel shaft incompatible with the somber granite base, while others abhorred the idea of tampering with a popular icon immortalized in stamps, currency, and postcards. The shaft was eventually removed two years later upon the request of the then Secretary of Education Alejandro Roces and the Director of Public Libraries Carlos Quirino. For some years it stood on the central reservation of Roxas Boulevard, across from the Redemptorist Church in Baclaran, to mark the Pasay-Parañaque boundary. Its present whereabouts, however, are uncertain.

Another notable sculpture on Roxas Boulevard is the statue of the Muslim leader of old Manila, Raja Sulayman. Designed by Eduardo Castrillo, it is situated in the aptly named Plaza Raja Sulayman, which paradoxically fronts the baroque-style Catholic church of Malate. The monument was immortalized in the Ishmael Bernal film Tisoy, where Maribubut, played by an 18-year old-Charo Santos, was seen polishing the bronze statue wearing blue jeans and a white T-shirt emblazoned with a Kabataang Barangay logo. As part of Mayor Atienza’s revitalization of the city, the area surrounding the plaza has now been pedestrianized and a large fountain installed.

Perhaps Roxas Boulevard’s most enduring, yet natural, attraction is the sunset across Manila Bay. This truly beautiful sight serves as a fitting backdrop for the many hundreds of families and lovers who still flock there each evening to enjoy precious moments together. As the garish artificial illuminations of the baywalk take over at dusk, they surely pale in comparison to the enduring grandeur and magic and God’s own lighting design for Roxas Boulevard, as it slowly descends behind the Bataan peninsula in defiance of the unbearable kitchness of being.

Manila-based designer Guillermo Ramos blogs at Bayang Magiliw. “Roxas Boulevard” has been published in the May 2007 issue of Muse Magazine. The story has been corrected since publication (thanks, S!).

Image: “Aerobics in CCP, Roxas Boulevard” by wysgal
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