Should art be a private or a public good?

Kuvaus

 

The unearthing and subsequent display of “Hymen, oh Hyménée!,” a 19th-century painting by artist Juan Luna opens a necessary discussion about who owns art.

Completed between 1886 and 1887, the painting won a bronze medal in a Spanish contest where the Filipinos, including Luna, won silver and gold medals. Luna kept the painting until his death in 1899. It later resurfaced in Spain in 1920, kept by an aristocratic family. Attempts were made to purchase it in the 1970s and 1990s to no avail.

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Today, many classic works are kept in private collections, but as art pieces also serve as markers of a people’s heritage, memory, and identity, this begs the question: Should such a public good stay solely in private hands?

Nolisoli spoke with Gio Caliguia, a former art division researcher for the National Museum now teaching history and Philippine Studies at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines. Caliguia also worked in the private sector as an art researcher for the auction house Casa de Memoria.

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