Philippine Daily inquirer

After a decades-long search, the family of Vicente Alvarez Dizon has located his painting that won first place at an international competition in 1939 which included the works of Salvador Dali and Maurice Utrillo.

The late Dizon’s masterpiece, “After the Day’s Toil,” which was last seen by the family in 1952 when it was transported to the country for the Philippine International Fair, is in the possession of Dr. Rogelio Pine, a Filipino cardiologist based in New Jersey.

Pine bought it in 1980 from Daniel Grossman of the Grossman Gallery, who in turn bought it from IBM New York when the company unloaded a number of paintings in the late 1970s.

Dizon, of the University of the Philippines’ then School of Fine Arts, painted “After the Day’s Toil” in 1936 as a graduation thesis during postgraduate scholarship studies at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.

When he returned home, he settled in Malate, Manila, and continued to lecture at UP, the National Teachers’ College, and other schools.

From 79 countries
In 1939, Thomas J. Watson, founder of International Business Machines (IBM), conceived the idea of holding an international art competition at the Golden Gate Exposition in San Francisco, California.

He sent his representative, Kevin Mallen, to 79 countries all over the world to scout for entries.

In Manila, Mallen visited Dizon at his residence on 1111 A. Mabini Street, to take a look at “After the Day’s Toil.”

Mallen purchased the painting for IBM immediately after seeing it, and had it framed and shipped to the United States.

It was included in the International Competition on Contemporary Art of 79 Nations at the Golden Gate Exposition.

In that historic competition, “After the Day’s Toil” won first place by popular vote. The entry of Spain by Dali won second place, and that of the United States won third.

Utrillo’s entry did not win.

Pacific unity
The inscription on the winner’s medal reads: “Unity of the Pacific nations is America’s concern and responsibility. San Francisco stands at the doorway to the sea that roars upon the shores of all these nations; and so to the Golden Gate International Exposition I gladly entrust a solemn duty. May this, America’s world’s fair on the Pacific in 1939, truly serve all nations.–President Franklin D. Roosevelt”

The Golden Gate Exposition was held in celebration of San Francisco’s two new bridges.

San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge were dedicated on Nov. 12, 1936, and May 27, 1937, respectively.

The exposition ran from Feb. 18 to Oct. 29 in 1939, and from May 25 to Sept. 29 in 1940.

Malate-born
Vicente Alvarez Dizon, son of Jose Sampedro Dizon of Bacolor, Pampanga, and Rosa Carlos Alvarez of Concepcion, Tarlac, was born in Malate on April 5, 1905.

The elder Dizon, an 1897 graduate of the University of Santo Tomas, was a landscape artist and botanist-agronomist at the Bureau of Agriculture.

In the course of his work, he was assigned to such places as Capas in Tarlac, Magalang in Pampanga, and Cabanatuan in Nueva Ecija.

The young Vicente had his early schooling at the Malate Primary School, and continued his intermediate studies in the towns where his father was assigned.

The father wanted his son to study medicine. The latter obeyed, and attended the National University College of Medicine in 1921-23.

Dizon later transferred to the UP School of Fine Arts, where he took a five-year course and graduated with an art diploma in 1928. After graduation, he became the first artist-lecturer of the Philippines.

He is among the first Filipinos to win important scholarships abroad, such as that awarded him by the Federal Schools of Art in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

On his own, he applied for, and was granted, a scholarship at Yale.

Honors
In 1936, during his stay at Yale, Dizon became the first Filipino to be elected one of the 12 members of the “Yale Phi Alpha.” (Only 12 members were elected each year from more than 300 students.)

It was also at Yale that he painted “After the Day’s Toil” as his thesis.

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GMA News

HAINES, Alaska – In this part of America known as the “Valley of the Eagles,” one Filipino soared high in the minds, hearts and stomachs of the people: Paul Piedad.

In Spanish, “piedad” (pronounced PIYE-dad) means godliness, pity or piety. Here, however, people say “PIE-dad,” perhaps, as a way of recognizing Piedad’s culinary skills.

“For a long time, most of the children in town believed he was called Piedad because he made such formidable pies,” Elisabeth Hakkinen wrote in her column that appeared in Chilkat Valley News on Oct. 17, 1974.

Hakkinen, a longtime town historian, founded Haines’ Sheldon Museum and Cultural Center, which kept a collection of newspaper articles and official records on Piedad.

Long before some eight million Filipinos became so ubiquitous in any part of the world, Piedad was already cooking his way into this quaint community – home to the Tlingit (pronounced Khling-kit) Indians, surrounded by glaciers, salmon-rich waters, and mountains that have become a playground for bears, moose, lynx, porcupines, wolves and cayotes as well as a habitat to 120 species of birds including the American Bald Eagle.

Piedad archives were only a handful. But they spoke volumes of how this Filipino immigrant meant to a lot of people in Haines.

“Paul’s floppy winter fur hat, his ever-present cigar… his friendly grin, and the sparkle in his eyes were familiar around Haines for many years,” said Hakkinen.

Sheldon Museum assistant Nancy Nash said much of the articles on Piedad were from Hakkinen family’s collection.

“I didn’t meet (Piedad). He died (on April 13, 1963) nine years before I came here in Haines,” said Nash. “But I know that there is a road named after him.”

Piedad Road, an unpaved two-lane stretch lined with Spruce and Hemlock trees, is located in the foot of Mount Ripinski, one of Haines’ highest peaks.

According to Hakkinen, Piedad was a houseboy who worked for a US Army officer in the Philippines. When the officer was stationed in Fort William H. Seward here, he took Piedad with him.

“The Captain’s lady and Paul would borrow me for a day or an afternoon… the visits delighted me as… I could help Paul make doughnuts and cookies. Paul called me ‘Lilla Laylie,’ which I accepted as his name for me,” said Hakkinen.

When the captain was transferred to another military base, Piedad, snowstorms and freezing cold weather notwithstanding, opted to stay in Haines.

Records showed that Piedad joined the crew of US Steamship, Peterson as a deck hand on Sept. 1, 1917.

Peterson was among the vessels that came to rescue the passengers of Canadian Pacific steamer Princess Sophia, which ran aground because of a storm. As the storm worsened, the rescuers had to take shelter themselves.

“It could be that Piedad was a witness to the sinking Princess Sophia on Oct. 23, 1918,” the greatest maritime disaster in Alaska’s history, said Nash. All 353 passengers died.

In the mid-1920s when a road was being built to make Haines accessible to Canadians, Piedad worked as a chief cook for the Alaska Road Commission.

“Paul also kept a bin (not a box, or a container, but literally a bin full of the most delicious doughnuts in the world – cake doughnuts, light and delicate, flavored with cinnamon, nutmeg, and a little allspice, and rolled in a special coarse sugar you just don’t see any more,” Hakkinen said.

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Philippine Daily Inquirer

MANILA, Philippines — Despite 400 years as a colony of Spain, the Philippines has retained little trace of the language but producers of the country’s only Spanish-language radio program says that’s about to change.

“Filipinas Ahora Mismo” — which loosely translated means “Philippines Right Now” — features book and movie reviews, information on the Spanish influence in different parts of the country and music by modern stars such as Enrique Iglesias and Ricky Martin, all in Spanish.

It is just a small step but its producers hope the show can help lead a revival in a language that has withered away in most of the Southeast Asian archipelago nation.

“It is not a question of making Filipinos speak Spanish again,” says Spanish ambassador Luis Arias Romero. “It is a question of making Filipinos aware of the importance of Spanish in culture and world affairs.”

The radio show, sponsored by the Cadiz Press Association, is part of this effort although the project’s manager Chaco Molina concedes they still have a long way to go.

Molina said when the Cadiz association first proposed the plan, they suggested an eight-hour radio show. “I told them that was too ambitious. This isn’t Guatemala where everyone speaks Spanish,” he said.

The show, hosted by veteran Filipino broadcaster Bon Vivar, airs from 7-8pm (1100-1200 GMT) Monday to Friday on government-owned DZRM radio at 1278 kHz in Manila and in simulcast to several major cities.

“I see a renaissance of the Spanish language in the Philippines,” says Molina, adding the show is aiming at a young audience who will be more receptive to the language.

What surprises Spaniards who come to the Philippines is the fact that their language has virtually disappeared.

The archipelago was first colonized by the Spanish in the early 16th century shortly after Ferdinand Magellan arrived in the islands and later died here in 1521.

Spanish culture permeates the country where 80 percent of the population are followers of a Spanish-styled Roman Catholicism and where 20,000 Spanish words have been absorbed into most of the local dialects.

Even today, Filipinos eat paella, menudo and chorizo, have brazo de Mercedes and turrones for dessert and drink San Miguel Beer and Fundador Brandy.

But when the Philippines passed from Spanish to American control after the Spanish-American war of 1898, English completely supplanted Spanish.

Today, most Filipinos speak and read English.

The most serious blow came in 1987 when the government removed Spanish as one of the official national languages of the country and did away with a requirement that college students take courses in Spanish.

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