Now here's a large, vintage oil portrait of our national hero, Jose P. Rizal. I have always been on the lookout for portraits of Philippine heroes as they always remind me of my early grade school days--when every classroom had a framed photo of a 'bayani' like Jose Abad Santos, Melchora Aquino, Marcelo del Pilar and the like.
The best portraits of course, were of the National Hero, Rizal, often done in oil and hanged in the most important parts of the school, like the Principal's Office or the School Library. Under the hero's gaze, we would read our borrowed books, with our mentors' hope that we would be inspired enough by Gat Rizal, to be heroic ourselves. But that, of course, was not always the case--so back to the story.
I actually found this 1953 painting online--first on ebay, then on a local buy-and-sell site. It was signed by Teofilo Tabac. and is rather large--24 in. x 35 in. The portrait is rendered in an oval background on a rectangular canvass, which, I thought was more unusual. It was relatively in good condition, saved for a few scruffs. The only drawbook was the price-- a staggering Php150,000 when first posted. At first I thought, this was a mistake--I had valued the painting to be between 10K-15K-- so I proceeded to contact the Seller. He verified that the price tag was indeed 150K, which was so way out of my league.
The painting did not sell after several re-postings, and so I proceeded to monitor its progress on the other site on which it was posted. A few weeks after, the Rizal painting was reposted with a drastically reduced price of 15K. By then, I had to put on hold on my artwork purchases and controlled my impulse to grab it.
It was the best decision that I ever made, because even at 15K, the fine painting did not sell--and once again, it was reposted with a 10K price tag. I sort of lost track of the painting when I went on vacation abroad for a month. While still in Auckland, I decided, on a whim, to check if the Rizal portrait was still online--and it was! And the price had gone down to 8K! The posting was to end in two days, but I would be away still, so no way could I possibly get this vintage work.
When I did get home two weeks later, I checked the portrait once more--it didn't sell! Thank God, I still kept the contact number of the Seller, so even if he had taken the item off the site, I managed to track her down. Over the phone, we concluded our deal (we agreed on 8K), got her adddress and sent someone to pick up the painting with my payment. A half-acnetury old painting of our great national hero was finally mine!
So here I am, on Rizal Day, musing over my Rizal find, recently reframed and restored by a local artist in nearby Angeles. It may be the work of an unknown artist, but I like the quality of the work--the preciseness of the hero's likeness, which was based on an older picture I've seen before in some old textbooks.
The overall execution of Rizal--pardon the pun--is excellent. I will most likely hang this Rizal portrait in my bedroom, above my bed (sorry, I have no library), where perhaps, it will inspire me more to write about historical things and stuff, until I say 'adios, patria adorada!'.
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