Located in Fort Santiago is the Jose Rizal Museum. This is an awesome
place. If the Fort has shrunk in any way, it is because the Museum has
grown inside it and has overwhelmed all other historical significance of
the historic Fort. In many ways, the Museum is larger than the Fort.
The Jose Rizal museum is a great piece of work. Portions of it are
minimalist in approach, like a japanese rock garden asking you to
contemplate and even meditate on the item at hand. Rizal's words are
writ large. His language skills are shown in with pride, not in
arrogance, but as a matter of fact. The presentation makes one look
small in comparison. The visitor enters and sees the words on glass and
etched on the walls. In the next room are more quotations, etched in
steel and translated in spanish, french, german and english. Rows and
rows of steel etched with words on both sides. Fronting these steel
columns are the heroes own works of art, sculptures and novels. Moving
outside, are more of his words embellishing the walls.
And in a small viewing room, almost morbid in the dark are more of his
words burning across the walls are these are back lit in yellow. Going
in to this room, you see in an adjoining room is a statue of the artist
writing in the gloomy dark, lit only by an oil lamp. Almost macabre,
there is a chain across the threshold to an anteroom. The statue is
further separated by glass at the doorsill.
The stairs to the second floor also serve as a gallery of paintings
about the man, including a protrait of Obei-san. And on the second
floor landing, there is a small picture of Josephine Bracken.
What few personal items of Jose Rizal are in glass cases in the next
room. Displayed are his trenchcoat, his fencing swords, his vest, and a
bullet embedded bone. And etched are comments by historians about the
man, the legend, and discerning between the two. The exhibits are
minimal and almost zen-like in this room. Airy and light, almost
flighty with quotations from Rizal and historians.
The next room however is an absolute abstraction. The room serves as an
exhibit. The walls shout with his words. "Mi Ultimo Adios" occupies
the whole marble wall. The floor also serves as canvas for his words.
The room itself is not all that large, however, devoid of anything and
serving as an exhibit in itself, it grows in your mind and in recounting
the experience, looking in hindsight almost three-fourths the size of a
basketball court. Or even larger.
Finally outside, are the last exhibit items. Translations of "Mi Ultimo
Adios" in varios languages.
The museum is mind-boggling.
Outside of the building, just across in one of the ruins is his statue
as he was bound and about to start his walk from his cell, to the Luneta
where he would be shot. The life-size statue stands amidst the ruins,
with bars as doors, so the visitor can see how high he stood which is
barely five feet in height. Just outside is an oversized marble marker
looking much larger than the statue. The visitor sees the prisoner that
was Rizal; sees the ruins without any roof and open to the elements; and
sees the steps on the pavement leading outside, and retracing his steps
to his execution. The visitor asks why the steps are small, and he sees
the small man, bound at the elbows and knees. He can walk, but these
would be small steps.
The man presented in the museum are his works, his genius and his
greatness in life. The man shown in the ruins is the prisoner about to
die and his greatness in accepting death for country.
There are other Jose Rizal sites, including his ancestral home and
birthplace at Calamba, Laguna and in Dapitan where he was exiled. And
across Europe, there are various places where Rizal historiacal markers
were installed, Leipzig, Brussels, London, Paris, Barcelona, and Madrid.
I have no idea when I'd be able to visit those (local and foreign) places.
--andoy
